Rating: 
Summary: Preaching to the Choir
Review: The book I always would have wanted to write. But someone much more capable beat me to it. Fantastic. Thanks Eric.
Rating: 
Summary: Much You Guessed - Much You Didn't
Review: This is a fact filled book. Those who would criticize it as anecdotal need only look at the extensive notes.Much of this book a reader would already have surmised from observing fast food joints - under paid workers with high turnover, fat content of food, etc. However, Mr. Schlosser adds the facts and shows that its even worse than one would have thought. More of this book is probably new to the reader (it was to me). The author goes into great depth about the new huge agribusinesses, how they are controlled and how they control the market, governmental agencies and politicians. Our meat producers are reaching trust proportions and are abusing their power as the old trusts did at the turn of the twentieth century. Frankly the book is quite depressing, and I'm not sure how savory I will find ground beef and hamburgers from now on. The epilogue and the afterword holds out some hope though. McD's has been making some responsible choices and it holds more sway in the industry than our federal and state agencies. Countering that optimism, however, is the recent incident of mad cow disease. Mr. Schlosser addressed mad cow in the European context, but before the incident occurred in this country. At times, the author is a bit alarmist. If one figured the odds of the "super e coli" infecting someone in such a manner as to make him sick, using the author's percentages, one would see just how threatening it is - or rather is not. A major criticism I had of the author's style is that at times Schlosser beat the proverbial dead horse and then beat it again. Overall, the book was interesting, very very informative and well worth reading.
Rating:
Summary: Dr. Michael L. Johnson
Review: This is one heck of a book! Not only did I read it, but I made my kids read it too! This is one of the best books on the fast food industry that I have ever read. I put it up there with one of my all time favorites " Diet for a New America " by author John Robbins. Read it and I guarantee that you will be a "slow food" connoisseur! Dr. Michael L. Johnson author of "What Do You Do When the Medications Don't Work--A Non-Drug Treatment of Dizziness, Migraine Headaches, Fibromyalgia, and Other Chronic Conditions".
Rating:
Summary: Fast Food Wake-up Call!
Review: I found this book utterly fascinating. I was hoping to read horrific revelations like in Upton Sinclair's The Jungle... and in the second half of the book I did! The first half mainly focused on shady politics, strange bedfellows, and unholy unions found in the industry. The recently added "afterword" about BSE (Mad Cow disease)was especially timely and frightening. I'm glad to have read this book and gained some enlightenment around fast food, but not sure yet what to do with this head full of disturbing information!
Rating: 
Summary: "expose" of what is already common knowledge
Review: Let me condense the pertinent facts of this book: 1. Fast food is bad for you.
2. You don't make a lot of money in a minimum wage job flipping burgers.
3. The animals that we eat, lead horrible, miserable, heartbreaking lives then die violent, painful deaths.
4. Fast food companies have made a lot of money and spread to the far corners of the earth. No one needs a book to tell them these things. Personally, I don't eat fast food because it tastes bad, gives me a stomach ache and makes my pants tight. If you eat McDonalds, well you are getting what you deserve. Don't blame "an industry" for your girth or your gas. Where I have to condemn the author is on two points: 1. Suggesting that the lure of employment at McDonalds is causing teenages to drop out of school. (!!!!!!)
2. Linking employment at fast food joints to being murdered. Kids quit school because they choose to quit school and have rotten parents who allow them to do so. There is free education in this country, and kids who need money can make a decent wage cutting grass, shovelling snow, babysitting, or working part-time. If kids are having to support families, that highlights a socio-economic problem, not the "lure" of working at McDonalds. If working at McDonalds confers some sort of status, well then that person is in a peer group that has profoundly low self-esteem--another problem you cannot blame on McDonalds. People are murdered because there are sick criminals among us who will always prey on the weakest establishments and individuals. If it isn't a fast food joint, it is a bowling alley.
Rating:
Summary: Compelling reading
Review: I had already picked up Stupid White Men and enjoyed it immensely so I knew I was in for a treat. This book doesn't fail to satisfy, Schlosser's insights into the fast food industry are not for the faint-hearted to say the least. What makes it all the more gruesome is that he expands in great detail on subjects that we suspected were true but didn't want to believe, like for example the hygiene standards in these so called restaurants. The arguments he presents are at the heart of some of our major national problems: obesity and lack of corporate responsibility. Greed in every sense of the word! Read it, you'll be compelled too.
Rating:
Summary: JUST MORE LIBERAL HOGWASH AND HALF-TRUTHS
Review: Well, this is an interesting book. But I must say... God Bless the Fast Food Industry! It represents all that is great with this country. If you don't like fast food maybe you should leave America or are a Communist. Even EUROPEANS love our American fast food, fancy French restaurants are going out of business because the French know a good thing when they see it and can't get enough Big Macs. Books like this are just wrong they say fast food is unhealthy and evil my brother eats nothing but fast food he's 39 and healthy as a horse. I think Schlosser must be jealous of fast food success and that's why he wrote this book. How sad. You can go ahead and click "Not Helpful" but by doing so you're admitting that I'm right and it scares you so much that you feel the need to censure me in some way. Go ahead, I am used to attacks by liberal nancy-boys. Final ratings - 1 out of 5 stars.
Rating: 
Summary: Good message, poor presentation, still worth reading
Review: The author has a good message that needs to be told. However he takes every opportunity to swipe at Presidents Eisenhower, Nixon, and Reagan, as if they're somehow responsible for the explosion in popularity in fast food. He also ties Christians and racist organizations to the industry and he really reaches on page 39 where he attempts to tie fast food to Walt Disney and the Dachau Nazi concentration camp. Strangely absent from all of this is how President Clinton was a McDonald's fan and how much growth the fast food industry saw in the 1990's. Hmmmmm. I don't see how this book will have broad appeal, particularly to Republicans and conservatives in this country. It's really sad because this is definately a message that needs to get out to the nation. We've become a country of obese, sickly individuals and the over-consumption of quick-and-easy fast-food definately contributes. Hopefully in future editions he'll stick to the topic and leave his left-wing political agenda aside.
Rating:
Summary: Do You Still Want Fries With That?
Review: Or better yet...do you still want that? Eric Schlosser takes you on a journey through every aspect of the fast food world, I mean Every Aspect. From the fore fathers of fast food to the meatpacking industry to behind the counter with the fast food employees to the chain owners and even to fast food outside of America. The humble beginnings of the fast food restaurants are quite interesting, but this beginning tale of the American Dream shortly turns into a downward spiral of the problems with development and the health and safety regulations and issues that lead to this dark side of the All-American meal. The images that Schlosser portrays through his brilliant writing sometimes cause the reader to cringe especially in the slaughterhouse condition descriptions with the cows standing in their own offal before being butchered. Schlosser's writing is entertaining as well as the subject matter. He circumnavigates the fast food world to provide the reader with more than a glance of the industry, but also a bitter taste. While his larger point is that the development of fast food chains has led to these poor working and less than quality food conditions, he also touches on Capitalism, exploitation of youth, and obesity. There is a reason that those fries taste so good, and Schlosser will let you know.
Rating:
Summary: no mo meat
Review: after digesting this tome unlikely to ever eat mickeyd/bk/et al ever again.
as a matter of fact, have stopped eating altogether
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