The Weirdest Thing I've Listened to This Month
Okay, so picture this: 6:15 AM, Caltrain is packed, I'm sandwiched between someone's oversized backpack and a guy who apparently bathed in cologne, and I'm listening to a vegan manifesto from 1910. This is my life now.
I honestly don't remember how this ended up in my queue. I think I was doom-scrolling through free audiobooks at like midnight after a particularly brutal code review, and "first vegan cookbook ever written" caught my attention. Historical curiosity, you know? Plus it's under 4 hours - perfect for a day's commute plus some buffer.
Here's the thing though. This isn't really a cookbook. I mean, yes, there are recipes at the end, but listening to recipe ingredients on audio is... a choice. (I skipped that part. No shame.) What this actually is? A surprisingly passionate argument for plant-based eating from over a hundred years ago. And honestly? Some of it hits different in 2024.
Ben Adams Carries This Thing
Let's be real - this could've been an absolute slog. We're talking Victorian-era prose about nutrition. The language is sophisticated, and by sophisticated I mean "sometimes I had to rewind because I zoned out trying to parse a sentence that went on for like 45 seconds." But Ben Adams somehow makes it work.
His delivery is clean and authoritative without being boring. He's got this way of hitting the more dramatic arguments - the ethical stuff, the "meat is literally rotting flesh" bits - with just enough weight that you're like, okay, I'm paying attention now. Clear production too. No weird audio artifacts, no background hiss. For what I'm guessing is a LibriVox recording, that's not nothing.
I couldn't find much about Adams online beyond this and a few other recordings, but based on this performance? The guy knows how to handle dense material. He doesn't try to make it something it's not. He just... reads it well. Sometimes that's exactly what you need.
Part Time Capsule, Part "Wait, They Knew This in 1910?"
So Rupert H. Wheldon - and apparently nobody knows much about this dude - basically wrote a manifesto. Historical arguments, ethical arguments, economic arguments, health arguments. The whole thing. And look, some of it is dated. Obviously. The science has moved on in a lot of ways.
But here's what surprised me: a lot of the core arguments? Still relevant. The ethical considerations about animal suffering, the environmental implications (though he doesn't frame it that way), the "you don't actually need animal protein to be healthy" stuff - it's all there. I got that same "wait, people understood this already?" feeling from Untethered Soul - turns out a lot of "modern" mindfulness concepts aren't that new either. Over a hundred years ago. That's kind of wild.
The tone though... okay, fair warning. Wheldon is not presenting a balanced "here are both sides" argument. He's basically saying "I'm right, meat-eaters are wrong, here's why." Some listeners called him a "vegetarian fundamentalist" and yeah, I can see that. If you're looking for nuance, this ain't it. But if you're interested in the history of the vegan movement and want to understand where these ideas came from? Pretty fascinating.
I finished it in about 2.5 commutes at 1.5x speed. The philosophical sections flew by. The recipe section... like I said, I skipped it. Recipes in audio format are just not it for me. That's not the book's fault, that's just a format problem.
Who Should Actually Listen to This
Perfect for: History nerds, vegans/vegetarians who want to understand their movement's roots, anyone curious about how people thought about food ethics before it was trendy. Also genuinely good for commutes - you can zone out for a bit and pick back up without losing the thread.
Skip if: You want a modern, science-backed nutrition guide. Or if preachy tones bug you. Or if you're hoping to actually use the recipes - just get the print version for that.
The ROI on this audiobook is... honestly pretty good? It's free (LibriVox), it's short, and it gave me something interesting to think about. I texted Kevin about it and he was like "why are you listening to a 114-year-old vegan book" and I was like "because I contain multitudes, Kevin."
The Verdict
Bottom Line: Worth your commute if you're into food history or early vegan philosophy. Not a practical cookbook in audio form. Ben Adams does solid work with challenging material. The fundamentalist tone might bug you, but honestly? It's kind of refreshing to hear someone just... commit to their argument without hedging.
I'm not converting to veganism or anything (sorry, Rupert), but I'm glad I listened. Sometimes you want hard sci-fi narrated by Ray Porter. Sometimes you want a Victorian dude yelling about the evils of flesh-eating at 6 AM. Balance, you know?
3.5 stars. Would recommend sampling first to see if the tone works for you.
