Book Review: All Natural

When Nathanael Johnson was a child, he was considered the skeptic of his family. The son of two technophobic, medicine-eschewing nature lovers, he grew up constantly questioning his father's hippy ideals and complaining about his forced time outside. But when his wife was pregnant with their first child, he faced a dilemma: place his faith in modern medical technology despite a puzzling recent rise in maternal mortality, or repeat his own mother's at-home birth despite the unexpected complication that nearly killed her?

Johnson's attempt to make that choice provides the opening for his book All Natural: A Skeptic's Quest to Discover if the Natural Approach to Diet, Childbirth, Healing, and the Environment Really Keeps Us Healthier and Happier. Comparing modern Caesarean sections and Guatemalan birth customs, raw milk and upscale probiotic-infused yogurt, economically turbulent small ranches and high-tech factory farms populated by identical pigs, Johnson keeps searching for an answer to the question of nature versus technology. It is perhaps unsurprising that he never finds a clear winner, but some of what he discovers in his quest will surprise you. Whether you normally find yourself leaning toward the natural side or the scientific one, you might start to think a little differently about your own assumptions. - Michelle (Sunset)