Food is in the eye of the beholder. This book assembles an amazing and often stomach-turning array of things people put in their mouths. Quite apart from delighting readers with exotic entrees, Joanna Emery asks the burning questions:

- If you find Fluffy on your plate, does that qualify as pet food'? - Why do roughly 20 people a year die after eating the Japanese Seafood Special? - Why would someone pay more than $300 for bird saliva? - What's all the rage about Marmite and Vegemite? - Do you need to be from Transylvania to enjoy blood pudding and blood sausage? - Why would anyone indulge in geophagy—eating dirt? - Why do our food safety laws allow insect parts in peanut butter and chocolate?

Joanna was born in England, moving to Ottawa in the mid 1960s. From a young age, Joanna was instilled with a deep sense of curiosity, a passion for history, and a love of writing. In 1989, Joanna graduated with a Bachelor of Humanities from McMaster University with a major in history. Inspired by her eldest daughter, Veronica, Joanna began to create stories and poems for children. Joanna’s fisrt picture book, Melville Smellville (Small World Publishing, Nova Scotia), was released in 2001. Her work has also appeared in several magazines and anthologies including The Canadian Writer’s Guide, 13th Edition and Chicken Soup for the Single Parent’s Soul. Joanna’s second book, Brothers of the Falls (Silver Moon Press, New York), a middle-grade historical novel set in 1847 Niagara Falls, was published in 2004. Caring for a Colony was published in the fall of 2005. She has also authored three early readers due out in 2005, including Antonio’s Music, a biography of composer Antonio Vivaldi (Scholastic), and Louis Cyr, a biography of Canada’s nineteenth-century strong man (Scholastic). Joanna is a member of CANSCAIP, IBBY and the Canadian Children’s Book Centre. She lives in the historic town of Dundas, Ontario, with her husband, Greg and their three children. She has received two awards for her work, winner of Best Non-Fiction Article in the Hamilton and Region Literary Awards, and the Frances E. Russell Award for outstanding research for a work on Canadian children’s literature for a current project.

Joanna Emery's profile page