Publicity
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THE BOOK OF IMMORTALITY IS OUT NOW IN NORTH AMERICA!
Excellent early reviews in the Wall Street Journal, Discover, Parade, Booklist, and Publisher’s Weekly. More to come!
For US publicity, please contact
Kate Lloyd at Scribner
For Canadian publicity, please contact
Shona Cook at Doubleday Canada / Random House
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PLEASE NOTE: The reviews on this page are for my previous works.
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Click here for Fruit Hunters reviews from the United Kingdom
New York Times
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EDITOR’S CHOICE
Sunday Times Book Review, by Mary Roach, author of Bonk, Spook, and Stiff
“Lustrous and Exhilarating… Jawdropping… Adam Leith Gollner possesses a talent as rare and exotic as a coconut pearl… The Fruit Hunters is a paean to the overwhelming diversity of fruits on this planet, both botanical and human….At one point early in the book, the author explains how it’s possible to graft branches of different, say, citrus species onto one plant. A Chilean farmer, he writes, recently made headlines with a tree that bears plums, peaches, cherries, apricots, almonds and nectarines. It’s how I see Gollner: the talents of a food writer, investigative journalist, poet, travel writer and humorist grafted onto one unusual specimen. Long may he thrive.”
Janet Maslin
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‘BEST SUMMER READ’
New York Times book critic Janet Maslin on CBSNews.com:
“Colorful, oddball nonfiction about some of the weirdest stuff that ever grew on trees or bushes. Yes, there is a fruit that smells like skunk. Yes, there’s a grape-flavored apple. The author describes bringing a mangosteen to a party and using it as a conversation piece. The factoids in his book will be used in the same way”
Martha Stewart
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Official Selection, Martha Stewart “Living Today” Summer Book Club
“From Florida to the jungles of Borneo, “The Fruit Hunters” is a fantastic summer read”
The Toronto Star
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Fruit Freaks Demand their Fix
“Highly entertaining… right out of a Tennessee Williams play… It’s a great story.”
Chicago Sun-Times
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Featured Book Review
“Gollner has spent the last decade trekking the globe to report on the fruit of the world — a topic he presents as much more expansive, fascinating, sexy, dangerous and tasty than your mom could ever have convinced you as a candy-craving child… Prose that is graphic and lyrical in ways distant from common food and wildlife writing”
The Financial Post
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Time to Expand your Exotic Tastes
“[Gollner] writes with such gusto, readers will find it hard not to put down the book and head out to the nearest fruit stand or farmers’ market on quests of their own.”
The Miami Herald
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Going off the Deep End in a Very Fruitful Study
“…enough historical facts, horticultural wonders and real-life adventures of fruit fanatics past and present to fill a thousand and one summer nights with delightful reading.”
Entertainment Weekly
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Book Review
“…you’ll delight in Gollner’s globe-trotting adventures seeking exotic produce”
The Globe and Mail
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Baby, Let’s Make Fruit Salad
“You may never look at a fruit basket the same way again”
Dallas Morning News
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A Quest for Edible Rapture
“…From the first page, exotic facts about fruit lead to hairpin turns into more exotic facts about fruit…a series of surprises, made delicious by a writer’s skill.”
Calgary Herald
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Cracking into Our Love of Fruit
“A fascinating look at the fruits we eat and why we eat them”
Washington City
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Berry Intriguing
“Fantastic… inspiring… wonderful… a multilayered magnum opus as well as a very personal love song to a food group.”
Milwaukee Sentinel
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Featured Review
“From the intoxicating prologue, in which Gollner thrusts us into the world of hotdog-size caterpillars and pulsating heat that is Rio de Janeiro, to the chilling closing chapter inside the fruit-making sanctuary of a Modesto, Calif., genetics lab, this is a fascinating chronicle of strange and wonderful food….Written with verve and ripe with detail, Gollner is certain to do for rare fruit what Susan Orlean did for rare orchids”
Portsmouth Herald
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Summer Joy in Elusive Fruits
“The charm of Gollner’s debut isn’t just his sensuous, hip and funny writing style, or the infectious enthusiasm…no, there’s more. Fruit biology, history, even fruit intelligence, weaves through this entertaining, informative, even riveting narrative. Readers will look forward to tagging along on Gollner’s next adventure”
The Hour
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COVER STORY
“Fruity Business”: An Interview with actor, musician and boulevardier Paul Spence
“Tales of the fruit trade that read like something out of an Ian Fleming novel”
Raleigh Observer
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Ripe Look at Fruits: Author Travels the Globe to Sample the Bounty
“…the epicenter of an exotic underworld of fruit collectors, fruit robbers, fruit speculators, fruit inventors, fruitaholics, fruitarians and fruit acolytes — all of whom populate the pages of Adam Leith Gollner’s lively new book…Gollner is a swashbuckling travel writer with a yen for adventure and high jinks.”
Int'l Herald Tribune
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Yes, it’s the same as the Times review, but imagine Jean Seberg’s accent caressing the tree-lined avenues
“Gollner’s is not the sort of talent one can develop. It is genetic, physical – an exquisite sensitivity of tongue, nose and eye.”
NPR
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Here on Earth: “The Lure of Fruits”
“A very good therapeutic tool for lifting you out of a depression”
Canadian Geographic
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Book Review
“Almost guaranteed to boost your daily intake, sending you prowling local markets for something to match his mouth-watering descriptions.”
Palm Beach Times
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Exotic Fruit Brunch
“You’ll never look at a mango quite the same way again”
New York Post
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The Fruit Hunters
“Part journalist, part detective, part scientist and part foodie, Gollner gives us a juicy look at the world of fruit.”
…An Endless Banquet
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Generation F
“…Nearly impossible to put down… There’s more to The Fruit Hunters than mere hype. Much more.”
Sprig
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An interview with Gourmet Magazine’s wine consultant Michael Green on sprig.com, the Washington Post and Newsweek’s “online portal for ‘green’ content”
“A sweet and deliciously thrilling story, one that book-world insiders say is on track to win major awards”
read more
Miami New Times
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Miracle Fruit: The Untold Story
“Think it sounds dry? This book is as juicy as the “billiard ball sized blackberries” that grow in Latin America. Highly recommended.”
Read More
Chatelaine
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Featured Book Review
“Part history lesson and part science class, Montreal native Adam Leith Gollner’s examination of fruit and fruit enthusiasts (yes, they exist) will change the way you feel about the produce aisle.”
The Splendid Table
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NPR Interview with Lynne Rossetto Kasper
“Absolutely fascinating… Gollner makes eating exotic fruits sound like discovering an alternate universe – and the reason for being.”
Listen
Rabble
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Interview with screenwriter Elan Mastai
“A delightful read — at times it’s like you’ve crash-landed on an alien planet and you’re sampling all these extraterrestrial delicacies.”
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Publishers Weekly
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STARRED REVIEW
“A rollicking account of the world of fruit and fruit fanatics. [Gollner’s] traveled to many countries in search of exotic fruits, and he describes in sensuous detail some of the hundreds of varieties he’s sampled, among them the peanut butter fruit, blackberry-jam fruit and coco-de-mer… Gollner’s passion for fruit is infectious, and his fascinating book is a testament to the fact that there is much more to the world of fruit than the bland varieties on our supermarket shelves.”
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Kirkus Reviews
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The Fruit Hunters
“An informative, enlightening account of fruits and their role in human life… [Gollner] explores a mind-boggling array of fruits—including Rudolph Hass’s avocadoes, Ah Bing’s cherries and the foreign-weirdo-turned-megafruit kiwi… He brings us into the worlds of growers, wholesalers, marketers, agricultural officials, smugglers and branders. “Every time we eat a fruit, we’re tasting forgotten histories,” he writes, recounting how fruits have fueled wars, inspired religious worship, led to group sex and caused sensations [such as] the outbreak of pear mania in 19th-century America.”
NPR
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Miracle Mystery Fruit Turns Sourness Sweet
“It’s a tiny berry. But it works miracles when you eat it before sour foods. Lemons instantly turn from sour to sweet. Even a bologna sandwich turns to cake. In this interview, author Adam Leith Gollner provides a history of the berry.”
Listen Here
Cabinet Magazine
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Sweet Tart: An Interview with Adam Leith Gollner
“In 1974, under rather strange circumstances, the FDA banned miracle fruit and all its derivative products. Adam Leith Gollner’s forthcoming book on “the fruit underworld” examines the short, unhappy life of miracle fruit in the US. Sina Najafi spoke to him by phone.”
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Zink Magazine
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The Fruit Hunters
“Informative, quirky and enormously fun to read, The Fruit Hunters is Montreal-based musician and writer Adam Leith Gollner’s debut book. He explores the fruit world – from the exotic to the banal, the nutritious to the medicinal. There’s even an underworld of forbidden fruits just oozing with juicy tales behind our seemingly innocent choices.”
Read More
Both Hands
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The Fruit Hunters
“A fascinating read! This book makes me want to travel to far-away places just to eat exotic fruits. And it makes me incredibly annoyed at the paltry selection that we have here in the United States. Why don’t we have the ice cream bean? Why are we denied the miracle fruit, which makes sour things taste amazingly sweet? It turns out fruit is tied to all sorts of political nonsense, but that doesn’t keep people from constantly trying to bring better fruit to the Western World…”
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Gothamist
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Covert Dining in New York: Miracle Fruit
“The active ingredient in miracle fruit, or miraculin, is an ordinary glycoprotein molecule with some trailing carbohydrate chains which somehow change the way our tongue perceives taste. The effect, which wears off in a few hours, “isn’t like sugar, because [miraculin] isn’t exactly a sweetener,” Gollner says. “It’s an elusive, illusory effect that depends on what you eat afterwards…”
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WSJ
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Make Lemons Into Lemonade, Try ‘Miracle Fruit’
“After languishing in obscurity since the 1970s, miracle fruit, or Synsepalum dulcificum, is enjoying a small renaissance. In-the-know food lovers from Hawaii to Finland are seeking out the berry as a culinary curiosity… A French explorer known as the Chevalier des Marchais first encountered the effects in 1725 somewhere in West Africa, says Adam Gollner, who is writing a book about miracle fruit. The chevalier saw villagers eat the berry before consuming gruel and palm wine, so he gave it a try himself.”
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The Vue
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The Fruit Hunters
“In The Fruit Hunters, Adam Leith Gollner reveals a racy, exotic and sometimes scary side to the world of fruits, far removed from the stocked aisles, artificial lighting and elevator music familiar to western consumers… With its tales of international adventure, strange characters and shady conspiracies, The Fruit Hunters is a real-life X-Files for food lovers, political junkies and environmentalists.”
Strut Magazine
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Drop that Fruit!
“On customs declarations, lodged between important meat and dairy considerations, there’s a small, hard-to-notice question about bringing fruit into the country. Everybody always checks the “NO” box, but there’s a reason that question is asked. Some fruits are illegal. In the US, getting caught with a pitahaya, a durian or a loquat is a felony punishable by law…”
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The Montreal Gazette
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Mouth-Watering Read
“Adam Gollner, a writer who contributed several articles to Gourmet’s Montreal issue, said he loves the fact the city has managed to preserve its small neighborhood joints even as it experiences an explosion in the quality and number of high-end restaurants. “I love this place on Clarke St. called Niukee,” he said. “The owner is an opera singer and every Tuesday she hosts the meeting of an opera society at the restaurant… To eat is to celebrate life, and that’s one of the things we do best here in Montreal.”
Ukula
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On the Set of Goblin Market
“Right now, I’m working on turning mathematical equations into human language. I also make balsa wood rafts.”
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The New York Times
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A Remake of a Charity Song, by the Elite of Indie Rock
“We respect Band Aid’s ability to raise so much money for relief efforts, but their lyrics seem so misguided and inappropriate,” Mr. Gollner, 28, a member of the band Dessert, wrote in an e-mail message. “Africa isn’t a land ‘where nothing ever grows’ and ‘no rain nor river flows.’ And how are lines such as ‘Well tonight thank God it’s them instead of you’ supposed to be helpful?”
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The Montreal Gazette
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Tongue-In-Cheek Look at Halloween
“We’re working to save the lives of children. Having the voice of popular music is incredibly important,” says UNICEF Quebec executive Evelyne Guindon. “I’m so proud as a Montrealer that this great energy is coming from our city.”
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Maclean’s
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Brave Men Dare to Ask
“We’ve been getting concerned messages from thehalloweennetwork.com,” says Gollner. “They are people who are into Halloween all year round. They sent an email saying, ‘Could you please clarify your anti-Halloween activities to our five million viewers.’ So Elvira has been defending the song in cyberspace.”
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Vice Magazine
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Scaritable Donations
“The Arcade Fire happened to be in L.A., so they came over while fending off armies of orgasming record-label execs. Karen O made us sit outside while she recorded; then, gone in a flash, she forgot her bong in our car. Malcolm McLaren asked to come record his part at 7:30 AM: “Not the most rock and roll time of the day,” he acknowledged in full Cockney. Before long, we were driving to Detroit to meet 60s soul legend Gino Washington in his 9-Mile kitchen.”
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The Montreal Gazette
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Piano’s On Fire, Pants are Off
“In Quebec, all these teenage boys and girls came to the stage and started pulling our pants off. Of course, that was after we set the piano on fire…”
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The Montreal Mirror
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Molecular Spectacular
“It is like biting into a nouvelle vague peach. Our sound is the beauty of geometric abstraction. It is gilded lace in a world of bitter, salted tears. Our music is a gossamer loincloth in a dark cave of minotaurs. Truth be told, our music is a smoky, impenetrable fortress.”
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