Year of No Sugar: A Memoir

I mostly enjoyed this memoir about a family who spent an entire year gong without added sugar. That is an enormous undertaking and most people would either shy away from it completely or not be able to get through it. This family does and their experience is recounted here. I liked the author's writing style. She is funny and honest and the book reads like a long blog of her project, more of an odyssey. Of course, living without sugar causes the, to have to make much of their food from scratch and this leads the author to question more deeply the disconnection of people in the modern age from what they eat and since eating is a way of social an cultural way of bonding, from each other. This questioning leads her to spend time with people who produce most of their own food, including killing their own chickens.The caveat is when she goes to visit them, the description is quite graphic and when her friend turns to her and asks is she'd like to try it, she doesn't refuse. If this kind of scene would upset you, either skip over it or avoid the book. The scene depressed me and detracted from my enjoyment of the book to some degree even though i could see what she was getting at and connecting it to the overall narrative. She used o be a vegetarian but discovered that she felt much healthier eating meat ad went back to it. I have the same experience. I was vegetarian and developed a health problem that going back to eating meat helped to heal. This fact is an inner struggle for me and while it may be hypocritical to eat meat and not want to do the killing, i just have to live with the fact that i have this dichotomy inside me and it and was upset reading that scene.The other thing that upset me is something I've noticed has made its way into common usage in our language. The author, in having to limit her daughters sugar intake even when it upset them, referred to herself as a sugar nazi. She uses the phrase a couple times in the book. And then on another occasion just after they finished their year of no sugar, she says in a restaurant that it felt nice to just order their food rather than put the waitress through the Spanish inquisition asking lots of questions about the sugar in the food. At first i thought, okay, maybe the author is jewish and if she is, it would take the sting out of her using such phrases so casually, but then at some point she refers to her german ancestry and growing up going to church. So a person of german christian ancestry casually using the phrase nazi and Spanish inquisition made me cringe. It did hinder my enjoyment but at the same time, i also realized she is not a crazy antisemite, she is using common wordage these days but i really hate when people use that expression. Anyone with proper knowledge of what happened in nazi Germany and during the Spanish inquisition would really be more sensitive. Honestly, i would tell her to pull the book, fix those things and rerelease it. I am a publisher, i know what it takes to do that but i would do it anyway in this case. If you think I'm being oversensitive, then you have never been treated with antisemitism and don't know what it feels like.The takeaway of this review is that it is a good book with a likable writing style and has a good message about food and about the syndrome of how much sugar we consume these days and how saturated our diet is with it, making us unhealthy in epic numbers. However, the two points i mentioned hindered my complete enjoyment which is why i gave the book four stars instead of five. Quite reasonable in the face of feeling like there was some real insensitivity in the language at times.

While I happened to stumble across this book and order on the last day of the pre-sale, I never ordered it thinking "Yes! I want to quit sugar"! lol But the truth is, this book is very eye-opening and at the least, makes you contemplate the idea of removing sugar.Eve presents a good amount of sugar facts and does a great job explaining them in depth. It's probably a little odd that I bought this book seeing I am the farthest thing from being a sweets addict (as salt is MY personal downfall), but its not really what this book was about in whole. Eve presents the idea that this toxin,sugar, is in so many other items we eat, items we dont think sugar is in (exp: gravy).I enjoyed this book from start to finish. (Finish being 3am this morning). I couldnt put it down. I love that she shared her family stories and how the girls dealt with the year, including Greta's (very wise and beyond her years) journal posts. I enjoyed the panicked struggles with "to eat or not to eat sugar" while on vacation. And most of all I loved how they reminded us that dessert is a treat, not a daily item we should have.As I read this book over the last week I became more aware (while at the grocery store) of all the items that included sugar. I actually looked as I chose things to add to my cart. I may not be to the place Eve is, but I feel Im not far from it. I feel Ive entered into the "sugar investigative phase", a place I know Eve once was before this project officially began and I look forward to further research and making changes in my own family's lives.Thanks for the book Eve!

Year of No Sugar is an eye-opening book that casts a light on the plethora of food that contain added sugar. Eve Schaub made it her mission to eliminate sugar (with a few caveats) from her family's diet.Having made it a goal to eliminate sugar from my own diet, this book fit right in with my research. It was a true-to-life account of the struggle to avoid sugar for the sake of health. Year of No Sugar captured the many situations where avoiding sugar became a social matter, and a topic that could cause family dissent.Although the case for giving up sugar, and the ensuing health benefits were all nicely laid out, the conclusion of the book seemed dismal.The question asked by people purchasing this book may be "Is it possible to give up all sugar?" The answer seems to be: No.Honestly, this may be alright. If your goal is to weed out any tiny additive sugar and would like a guidebook on how this looks in real life, this book will help. If you would like to "give up" sugar in your diet, but do not want to obsess about food 24/7, this book may be discouraging. Everyone has to find their own balance. Perhaps read this book as a reality check, but do not let the finite approach to eliminating sugar dishearten you in the quest for better health through sugar avoidance.

I found the anecdotal narrative approach to “what would live without sugar look like?” very engaging.Two pet peeves with this book1. Added sugar and fructose are NOT the same. Clearly we’ve come a long way in a decade in that added sugars are now a mandatory part of nutrition information, but that will include Eve’s beloved dextrose2. She gets preachy/philosophical on marginally related topics, like Big Agriculture.On a separate note, she inspired me to look up jams and jellies made with other thickening agents. I don’t know how well they keep, but jam/jelly recipes using agar agar exist, and they don’t need sugar to set up.

I really enjoyed this book. I used the Whispersync option, reading and listening. It is an interesting story to hear how people view clutter, hording and/or what may be just a very big mess. I also found it hard to relate to how Eve, and probably many other people, feel that if you remove the physical item then the memory and emotions also disappear. I can accept that a physical item may jog your memory of an event, but for me, I don't think it is necessary to have a physical item in order to remember an event. I could also really relate to the concept of having rather than using because once you use something, once it's gone it's gone, so I have selected to have an item, or two, rather than use that item. I would recommend this to anyone who feels they have a hell room and want to hear how someone approached their hell room. It is not a self-help get organised book, so if you are expecting that then I would look for something. However, this can, and does, give you an idea of what to do and perhaps where to start.

It's okay, but not what I thought it would be. I would recommend it though; like I said it's okay.

I got the book because I wanted to be more aware of this sugar issue in food, but I wanted to read something about dealing with it in life and not just a scientific study. That way, the book fulfilled my expectations and was very useful.At the end I do think that it gets a bit too repetitive, as the anecdotes are (of course) about avoiding sugar all the time. At some point I just wanted to get to the recipes and start trying a new lifestyle as well. I do recommend it for people looking for a light and fun reading.

I felt it's a really really important thing to chose what I eat. Trying no sugar life myself, let me stress free for daily meal somehow.

very interesting book