Price: $9.94
Description: Former English professor Davis is founder and president of the nonprofit organization United Poultry Concerns. After introducing readers to a brief history of poultry farming and the natural and social lives of chickens, Davis focuses on the egg and broiler industries, primarily in the United States. This is followed by a chapter on slaughter, which provides more gruesome detail than some readers will find comfortable. In the final chapter, vegetarianism, especially veganism, is promoted as the only effective solution. As one might guess from the title, chickens are considered from an animal-rights perspective, and this publication is intended as a consciousness-raising expose of what Davis sees as a cruel, obscene, and morally handicapped industry. There is not much new here, but the author does a good job of drawing from a wide variety of poultry science, animal-rights and other literature, including Page Smith and Charles Daniel’s marvelous The Chicken Book, to make her case. For animal rights collections and curious patrons who wonder where their eggs and chicken nuggets really come from.