The New York Times Book Review - Nick Reding
…Christopher Leonard's brilliant, in-depth portrait of Tyson Foods…is primarily a book of reportage, the culmination of Leonard's decade as a national agribusiness reporter…What separates The Meat Racket from every other book about food in America is that it manages to tell the story not from the safe remove of an outsider but from inside the fortress walls of Big Food itself, from the meeting rooms to the mega-barns. The result is a book that at times burns slow and hot with outrage and at other times proceeds at the ecstatic pace of a thriller.
Publishers Weekly - Audio
06/30/2014
In this history of Tyson Foods, veteran agriculture journalist Leonard details the impact of the company’s industrial model on family farmers, meat packers, and consumers. Pruden provides competent delivery as the narrative continually shifts from business biography to hard-hitting exposé. He is especially effective inhabiting the blunt essence of the three generations of Tyson men who, while very different in temperament and talents, all brought a bottom-line perspective to every facet of how animals reach the family dinner table. The boardroom mastery of the late Don Tyson—who took his father’s regional poultry operation and transformed it into a global powerhouse—especially shines through. Pruden, despite all of his acting skill, does not choose to tackle the full range of accents and dialects, particularly related to the racial and class transformations of chicken farming in Arkansas and surrounding states. He also handles some of the most emotionally charged content with understatement, though listeners already steeped in food-supply issues will feel sufficiently stirred by the content itself. A Simon & Schuster hardcover. (Apr.)
Publishers Weekly
03/31/2014
In the heated debate on food safety and availability, there have been other serious tomes about the national leviathan farming firms, but Leonard, former national agribusiness reporter for The Associated Press, pulls off a stunning feat in putting the heat on the major industrial meat giants. The hardest body blows are landed by Leonard on Tyson Food, the nation's biggest meat company, whose production and distribution practices were previously hush-hush, due to a rigid code of silence and potential retaliation on those who snitch. Founded during the Great Depression, Tyson Foods fashioned a highly profitable empire through smart alliances with bankers, creating a network of local contract farmers and keeping them on a short economic leash while controlling the entirety of the supply chain. Most alarming is the portion of the book that deals with the shortening of the amount of time it takes to raise a chicken, going from 73 days to 52 days during 1955 to 1982. Although Leonard devotes the lion's share of this exposé to Tyson Food, he also catalogues the feverish lobbying, clever patronage, and masterful financial and political schemes among the other giants, all in service of providing product cheaper and faster to the market. Best for those readers who want to know the origins of the animal products they are putting in their mouths. (Feb.)
Booklist
In his eye-opener to the inner workings of the corporations that control and manipulate the nation’s meat supply, journalist Leonard reveals how these vertically integrated behemoths operate to the detriment of both farmers, who do the hard and risky work of raising animals, and consumers, who have actually fewer true choices when shopping in the grocery store or ordering at the local fast-food franchise.
New York Times Book Review
Brilliant…a book that at times burns slow and hot with outrage and at other times proceeds at the ecstatic pace of a thriller.
New York Daily News
A fascinating look at what has happened in the past decades to the meat business as huge companies essentially staged a takeover while no one, except struggling farmers, paid mind.
Grist
A minor miracle of reporting. Tyson isn’t the sort of company that likes to show reporters around its operations…Leonard managed to penetrate that secrecy, and has painted an intimate picture of the company and the people who made it.
Eric Schlosser
Cruelty, greed, and monopoly power—that is what Christopher Leonard has found at the heart of America's meat packing industry. This book offers a devastating portrait of an industry's irresponsible behavior.
The Washington Post Bethany McLean
"Only a very good writer could turn a story about chickens, hogs and cattle into a thriller, and Leonard is that. He brings his characters to life. . . . The book is a scary portrait of capitalism run amok."
Bookforum - Jessica Valenti
A meticulous exposé of the meat industry… Leonard, whether he means to or not, is also telling a broader story about American business, consumerism, and—most of all—greed… What makes The Meat Racket stand out is Leonard’s superb storytelling and his clear passion for the topic…He is a man on a mission—and that is clearly the best kind of reporter to write a book like this.
Strategy + Business
One of the best books of investigative reporting that I’ve seen in quite a while…if you think muckraking is dead or even on its last legs, The Meat Racket is proof positive that it’s very much alive. The big question is whether or not there are any reformers and regulators left who have the will and the strength to pick up the ball and run with it.
The New York Times Nicholas Kristof
Leonard’s book argues that a handful of companies, led by Tyson, control our meat industry in ways that raise concerns about the impact on animals and humans alike, while tearing at the fabric of rural America.
Radish Magazine - Sarah J. Gardner
I will admit when I picked up this book, it was more with the sense that it was something I should read than something that would be a page turner. And yet it immediately drew me in. Christopher Leonard's power is the ability to capture the human lives caught within the system, particularly the farmers but also the employees who helped build the corporations… this book is a compelling reminder that we all have a stake in how this business is conducted.
Shelf Awareness for Readers
This eye-opening investigation into the semi-shady practices governing one of the nation's fundamental industries will make readers question how these megacompanies were ever allowed to grow so large and powerful…. A compelling in-depth exposé of the concentration of wealth and power at the heart of the U.S. meat industry.
The Daily Beast (Top 10 Nonfiction Books of 2014)
"[A] scorcher of a book."
Tracie McMillan
Leonard’s primary concern is the grim and gripping story of how American meat went industrial. But he also spins a nuanced tale of how the family farm was America’s first small business—and what we’ve lost by letting it go. A fascinating read.
Wall Street Journal
"Gripping...The Meat Racket is a riveting book, and the picture Mr. Leonard paints is a disturbing one."
From the Publisher
"Filled with interesting history of how the meat industry got to where it is and how government has attempted to reign it in, the sad story is laid out through excellent journalistic reporting. Narrator John Pruden's fittingly somber tone conveys the gravity of the situation. " ---Library Journal Audio Review
Booklist
In his eye-opener to the inner workings of the corporations that control and manipulate the nation’s meat supply, journalist Leonard reveals how these vertically integrated behemoths operate to the detriment of both farmers, who do the hard and risky work of raising animals, and consumers, who have actually fewer true choices when shopping in the grocery store or ordering at the local fast-food franchise.
New York Daily News
A fascinating look at what has happened in the past decades to the meat business as huge companies essentially staged a takeover while no one, except struggling farmers, paid mind.
Wall Street Journal
"Gripping...The Meat Racket is a riveting book, and the picture Mr. Leonard paints is a disturbing one."
From the Publisher - AUDIO COMMENTARY
"Filled with interesting history of how the meat industry got to where it is and how government has attempted to reign it in, the sad story is laid out through excellent journalistic reporting. Narrator John Pruden's fittingly somber tone conveys the gravity of the situation. " —Library Journal Audio Review
Library Journal - Audio
06/15/2014
Leonard's exposé of the very few companies at the heart of the American meat industry, his first book, will make listeners pause before they make their next purchase of poultry, beef, or pork. Forty years ago, more than 36 companies produced half of all the chicken Americans ate. Now there are only three that make that amount, and they control every aspect of the process, from the egg to the chicken to the chicken nugget. While this vertical integration model is legal, it comes at the expense of the farmers—and the consumers. Filled with interesting history of how the meat industry got to where it is and how government has attempted to reign it in, the sad story is laid out through excellent journalistic reporting. Narrator John Pruden's fittingly somber tone conveys the gravity of the situation. VERDICT Recommended for libraries where such books as Salt Sugar Fat and Fast Food Nation are popular. —Donna Bachowski, Orange Cty. Lib. Syst., Orlando, FL
JUNE 2014 - AudioFile
This detailed history and exposé of America’s factory farming system will make listeners think about what they eat in a new way. Narrator John Pruden delivers a clean narration of a complex subject loaded with passion. His professional detachment lends authority without adding bias, even when delivering the eulogizing of the hero/villain of the piece, Don Tyson, by his friend Bill Clinton. Further, Pruden’s authoritative voice imparts gravitas, and his pacing matches Leonard’s writing style. Those who listen to this riveting account will ask themselves whether the ways our food is acquired, paid for, and politicized may be out of whack. M.C. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2013-12-25
An engrossing report on the industrialized American meat business. Leonard, a fellow at the New America Foundation and former national agribusiness reporter for the Associated Press, debuts with a richly detailed examination of factory farming, which has reshaped small-town life for the worse in Arkansas, Iowa, Oklahoma and elsewhere, leaving a handful of huge companies with "unprecedented control" over the U.S. meat supply—most notably Tyson Foods, the biggest, which has $28 billion in annual sales with $780 million in profits. Using Tyson as a window on modern meat production, Leonard shows how the company has eliminated free market competition through vertical integration, buying up independent suppliers (feed mills, slaughterhouses and hatcheries) and controlling farmers through restrictive contracts. The strategy, soon a blueprint for other firms, worked first in the chicken business, then in the hog industry (some 90 percent of all hog farms disappeared), and now threatens the cattle business, where a minority of ranchers refuse to abandon their independence. As the author observes, all of this occurred out of sight of most Americans, who from the 1960s to '90s knew only that meat was cheap and plentiful in fast-food restaurants and supermarkets. Now, cost savings from factory farming are slowing down. In the meantime, rural communities have been "chickenized," with farmers dependent on the company in a bizarre, near-feudal system that forces many into bankruptcy. Sometimes, hopeful immigrants take over abandoned farms, only to face the vicissitudes of the least-profitable corner of the corporate meat business. Tyson's "cost-cutting ethos and the lack of competition restrains income growth in rural America," writes the author, and strong lobbying defeated the Obama administration's recent attempts at reform. Leonard's book traces the rise of Tyson, from its creation by former fruit farmer John Tyson in the Depression to the chicken evangelism of his son, Don, who spent 14 years convincing McDonald's to add chicken to its menu and helped make chicken the nation's most-consumed meat. An authoritative look at a ruthlessly efficient system.
