Local author Mark Essig debuts Lesser Beasts: A Snout-to-Tail History of the Humble Pig

Local author Mark Essig recently debuted his book Lesser Beasts: A Snout-to-Tail History of the Humble Pig with Basic Books press, earning praise from media giants like The Economist and The Guardian.

Here’s information from the jacket of the book, sourced from Essig’s website:

Unlike other livestock, which pull plows, give eggs or milk, or grow wool, a pig produces only one thing: more pigs. Incredibly efficient at converting almost any organic matter into nourishing, delectable meat, swine are nothing short of a gastronomic godsend. As historian of science Mark Essig shows in Lesser Beasts, pork has been a crucial staple of the human diet since ancient times. Yet the very qualities that make pigs so essential—their intelligence, hardiness, and omnivorousness—have also led people throughout history to demonize them as craven, opportunistic, and unclean. Today’s inhumane system of factory farming, Essig explains, is only the latest instance of people taking pigs for granted—and the most recent evidence of how both species suffer when our symbiotic relationship falls out of balance. An expansive, illuminating history, Lesser Beasts celebrates the long-suffering creature that has been a mainstay of civilization since its very beginnings—whether we like it or not.

To order a signed copy, visit Malaprop’s webpage. The author will also be visiting Durham’s Regulator Bookshop on Monday, June 22, at 7 p.m. and Greensboro’s Scuppernong Books on Tuesday, June 23, at 7 p.m.