Friendly Fire, by Nathan & Jennifer Winograd

CreateSpace, ISBN 9781479268931, October 2012

It's fair to say up front that Nathan Winograd is not a calm, easy-going kind of guy. He's a passionate advocate for shelter reform and animal welfare, and he does not mince words or give quarter to those who disagree with him.

This is a tough discussion of what's wrong in the American animal sheltering system, what can be done about it, and what, or rather, in his opinion, who the problems are.

The Winograds discuss, in sometimes painful detail, what's wrong in many American shelters: bad hours, bad hygiene, bad procedures, poor standards, high kill rates that have nothing to do with the animals that come in and everything to do with bad standards of care, inaccessibility, and obstacles to, rather than promotion of, adoption.

Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows: An Introduction to Carnism: The Belief System That Enables Us to Eat Some Animals and Not Others, by Melanie Joy, Ph.D.

Conan Press, ISBN 9781573244619, November 2009

Melanie Joy is the leading researcher in the field of carnism, a field she invented. If that sounds a tad catty, sorry, but I'm laboring under the burden of having actually read her book.

Dr. Joy purports to give us a thoroughly researched discussion of the psychology of why we eat meat, and why we eat some animals and not other animals. This book has gotten a lot of praise, for it's fairness and respectful attitude towards people who eat meat. I'm honestly mystified by that praise. The assumption of the moral superiority of veganism is quite clear. It's true she does assume that us carnists are doing it because we're bad people. No, she assumes it's because we don't know any better, are ignorant, brainwashed, and perhaps not very bright. This book is poorly researched, poorly reasoned, and overall pretty silly.