I thought it would be interesting, but the writing style is boring. The author makes statements but does not really go into detail to support his scientific findings. ( )

This is yet another entry in the single-subject world of non-fiction. The narrowness of focus in books such as Salt and Cod and The Book on the Bookshelf and The Pencil and Longitude seems to be an increasingly preevalent trend in publishing. I am all for it on one level, since I like delving into the abstruse and wallowing in details that leave most people I know colder than a penguin's butt in the middle of the Antarctic winter; but on another level, I want to stop these publishers before they bore again with books inadequately edited and organized.

There are three pieces to the banana...the history of humanity's first cultivated plant (modern evidence from New Guinea shows human cultivation from 9000 years ago was of bananas, but for their corms not the fingers we eat today); the politics of the modern cultivation of the banana (the term "banana republic", which I have used without thinking for 30+ years, has a very literal beginning and a scarily modern ring); and the future of humankind's most basic and widely distributed food crop (essential to survival in several parts of the world, the banana is also under threat from several pests that defy modern chemistry to abate, still less conquer, and squeamish food-o-phobes in wealthy countries oppose all modern genetic engineering that could save the survival crop of many parts of the world). These three strands are awkwardly interwoven, with no obvious guiding editorial hand to make sense of their interrelation.

It's a shame, too, because this is a huge, important topic, and the author's not inconsiderable talents are well-used in bringing the facts to light. The loss of our American favorite banana, the Cavendish, from grocery shelves will be an inconvenience at most; the fact that two major American corporations are, double-handedly (is that a word?), responsible for the spread of the blights that threaten the world crop with the complicity of the American government, should mean that we as a country are liable to find solutions to the pressing problems of food security in the places we've so screwed over. Free. But that won't happen, you can bet on that.

Back to the book...too much narrative drive is lost in the author's back-and-forth cross-cutting of the basic story. I wish someone had said, "Yo Dan...first third of the book is the banana as a plant; second third is the politics of the banana; last is the science of the plant." I wonder if that was what they tried, and the interconnections of all the information prevented its success? I somehow don't think so.

It's a good-enough book on an important topic that SHOULD cause each person who reads it some discomfort at our societal callousness and myopia. I recommend it to those most likely to be irritated by progressive politics and social liberalism. Isolationists particularly encouraged to apply! ( )

Read Dan Koeppel's Banana: The Fate of the Fruit that Changed the World (Hudson Street Press, 2008), and I bet you'll never look at a banana quite the same way again. Expanding on a 2005 Popular Science article, Koeppel's book is a biological, political and commercial history of the banana. It is also a call to action, since the banana as we know it may be just years away from disappearing completely thanks to a fast-moving series of pathogens which have the potential to bring its reign atop the fruit bowl to a precipitous end.

Part travelogue, part exposé, part history lesson, Koeppel's book takes us from the banana plantations to Latin America to the village plots of Africa to the research labs of Belgium, where scientists are racing against time to combat the spreading plague and make the world safe for bananas. What remains to be seen is whether the ultimately successful fruit will be the variety we currently eat (the Cavendish), or if some other version will have to be (or even can be) modified to meet the consumer needs the Cavendish currently satisfies (easily transported, hard to bruise, on a regular ripening schedule). It's happened before; the variety of banana grown and marketed until the late 1950s was the Gros Michel, which succumbed to the same cocktail of diseases our current banana faces today.

The banana's checkered past is laid bare here as Koeppel peels away the decades of nefarious practices engaged in by the large banana companies in Central and South America and the Caribbean as they fought each other for the commercial edge (and in the process greatly abused their works, the environment, and the governments of the nations they practically controlled). And Koeppel's point about the inherent weaknesses of the banana as an export crop is a good one: if we followed the precepts of locavorism, the banana would be about the last thing most of us would be eating, and perhaps that's the way it should be. But, as he writes, that seems unlikely, so perhaps at least understanding what's behind what we're eating is the best we can do for now.

A worthy book; I learned a great deal.

http://philobiblos.blogspot.com/2009/... ( )

Detailed and interesting look at the past, present and future of bananas. Surprised by the level of involvement of banana companies in South American government; even more surprised by US involvement on behalf of the banana companies. Provides some insight into the efforts by researchers to develop a banana that would be capable of replacing the Cavendish, which is plagued by disease. Brief discussion on genetically modified foods (author believes this may be the only way to save the banana). ( )

Did you know that more bananas are eaten world-wide than apples and oranges combined? I do now, thanks to this interesting discussion of bananas -- their biologic, political and commercial history.

Dan Koeppel has researched his subject well, and written an accessible and never boring book. Bananas are actually sterile berries; each is a genetic clone and therefore vulnerable to disease. Panama disease is threatening the fruit now, and because it is a food staple in much of the world, this has much larger ramifications than what to slice over our cereal every morning.

I really recommend this fascinating look at something we very much take for granted. ( )

Bananas start my day. I eat one almost every morning and seldom leave a grocery store without a fresh bunch. But the familiar yellow Cavendish banana is a threatened fruit, succumbing to Panama Disease in several parts of the world and facing extinction like the Gros Michel banana so popular 50 years ago.

I heard about this threat a few years ago but the details were vague. I reacted to it with disbelief. How could a common fruit available at the corner store for 79 cents per pound be in peril? But it is, and it has been for decades. Dan Koeppel's new book, Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World, explains it all and delivers a few surprises, too.

Koeppel, the author of To See Every Bird on Earth (a book I enjoyed a couple years ago), takes us on a history of the banana with all its innovations, corruption, and place in our culture.

* Innovations: Transporting a tropical fruit to northern markets before rotting brought about the beginnings of the modern fruit industry.
* Corruption: There's a reason 'banana republic' is a derisive term. The one or two largest banana companies operate in the shadow of terribly shameful histories.
* Culture: I need only to mention vaudevillians slipping on a peel, "Yes, We Have No Bananas", and that oval blue sticker.

Between the tragic tales of oppression in Central America and curious banana miscellany, Koeppel returns again and again to the research and strategies involved in the nearly century-long battle to save the Cavendish banana crop. The banana is eaten by more people around the world than apples and oranges combined, he says. It's more critical to their diets, too.

It's also more vulnerable. Every seedless Cavendish is a clone of it's mother plant, difficult to cultivate and susceptible to disease. Panama Disease, Black Sigatoka, and several other plant-choking maladies have already ravaged plantations across Asia and Africa. It's only a matter of time before it threatens Central America, devastating not only the fruit but the people and whole economies dependent on the banana. Banana republics have never had it easy.

I eat a Cavendish daily. I've had red bananas before. Lately I've been cooking plantains, too. I'd like to try some of the other varieties Koeppel mentions, but they are mostly unavailable in the United States due to economic reasons. Disease-resistant bananas might prove to be the solution to the Cavendish's problems, but, ironically, such engineered marvels would be unavailable in most foreign markets that prohibit genetically-modified foods.

There's no easy solution. The banana is a delicious fruit surrounded by problems.

[More of my book reviews are available at mostlynf.wordpress.com]

Absolutely fascinating book on something so obsequious and mundane, just sitting there slowly ripening on the kitchen counter. From the story of Adam and Eve to CIA coups to biodiversity, this book covers a lot of territory and Dan Koeppel keeps it fun and fascinating. Definitely recommended. ( )

I don’t usually like bananas, but after reading Koeppel’s lyrical description of what one writer called “an elongated yellow fruit” I had to rush right out to Publix and buy a bunch. Then I ate them, one by one, as I devoured the rest of this fascinating little book. I learned that bananas “are the world’s largest fruit crop, and the fourth-largest product grown overall, after wheat, rice, and corn” (xiii). But more than that, I learned how the most popular banana in the world, the one I sat slowly savoring, the Cavendish, is in real danger of extinction; partly because most cultivated bananas are genetic clones of one another. I learned that bananas, not rice, are the food staple that keeps a large part of the world alive, and that frantic efforts have been underway for a while to breed a hardier and still appetizing banana – one that is resistant to a rapidly spreading and devastating blight. Koeppel’s clear prose lays out the story of the banana, from its possible spread from Asia to Africa, to the rewriting of the geopolitical map of Latin America by United States’ fruit conglomerates. This well-written work should be a welcome companion to other books on vital world food resources, such as Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World and The Omnivore’s Dilemma. Highly recommended. ( )

A quick read at 241 pages - finished it in one day, lot of white space, pictures and easy magazine-style grammar. Standard non-fiction journalistic narrative, there is no main character (other than Koeppel), the mystery driving the "plot" is the current plight of the Banana to disease and the history of how it came about. Along the way we learn there are 100s (1000s ?) of varieties of banana's, of which most Americans have only ever tried or seen one, the ubiquitous Cavendish. Some interesting bios. Light read. ( )

More of a page turner than I ever imagined it could be, this book keeps you guessing about the fate of the beloved fruit. It is well researched, and the history of the industry that spawned America's favorite fruit is full of adventure, optimism (often misguided), and a healthy does of American corporate greed and ingenuity.

It's a quick read, and leaves you wishing your friends would pick it up too, so they don't look at you crossly for wanting to discuss the ravages of Panama disease or black sigatoka. ( )