Scott Gold’s The Shameless Carnivore, which we wrote about last fall, no longer has the edible-animal-manifesto field to itself: Despite a long and positive review in T magazine last Sunday, competition is on its way in the form of The Compassionate Carnivore, a considerably less genial creed than Gold’s that's coming out on April 21. Where the latter is a lightly self-assured journey though the joys of eating everything on four legs, the latter, by the felicitously named Catherine Friend, looks to be far more ethically rigorous (and less fun): “Catherine Friend tackles the carnivore’s dilemma, exploring the contradictions, nuances, and questions surrounding the bewildering choices facing today’s more conscious meat-eaters,” says the book’s promotional copy. Now that sounds like fun! Of course, the whole pleasure of eating animals is in forgetting what they used to be on the way to becoming that glistening, bronzed pork chop or plump, unctuous sausage. But that view seems to be a minority one nowadays.

Battle of the Beefy Books: Shameless vs. Compassionate Carnivore [Epi-Log/Epicurious]
Related: Greenpoint Man Eats Everything on Four Legs