Barn 8 by Deb Olin Unferth

Barn 8

Deb Olin Unferth

Three short sentences can hardly describe the whole range of impressions I got while reading this. Compassion for Janey, sympathy for the cause she gets involved in, extremely high appreciation for style and expression, experiencing languidness and urgency at the same time. So many voices, so many viewpoints, so many layers. I imagine great discussions with friends. A turbulent, mindblowing, unique ride…

Extract
We used to eat eggs a few times a year, but now they are everywhere, emerging from the nation’s farms at an alarming rate, seventy-five billion per year. Citizens must eat as many as we can. It is our patriotic duty. We must put them into all of our meals, all of our batters and bread and spreads and sauces, our breakfasts, on top of our meat or under it, inside our sandwiches, into all our snacks one way or another, our power bars and chocolate. But still that won’t be enough. Still more eggs are coming, piling up on the belts, leaving the farms, assembling on the grocery shelves, into refrigerators, more and more and more. We must soldier on, find other ways to consume them. We must put them on our faces, in our hair. We could grind up the shells and make toothpaste. We could build rocket ships and shoot the yolks off into space, small suns, we could explode them and smear the across a daylight sky.
Parallels
  • The Honey Bus; A Memoir of Loss, Courage and a Girl Saved by Bees by Meredith May
  • Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer
  • Letters to Anyone and Everyone by Toon Tellegen