Publicity

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For US publicity, please contact
Molly Dorozenski at Scribner

For Canadian publicity, please contact
Lesley Horlick at Doubleday/Random House

For Montreal publicity, please contact
Rita Schaffer Publicity (514) 937-1039

Publishers Weekly

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Starred Review

“A rollicking account of the world of fruit and fruit fanatics. [Gollner’s] traveled to many countries in search of exotic fruits, and he describes in sensuous detail some of the hundreds of varieties he’s sampled, among them the peanut butter fruit, blackberry-jam fruit and coco-de-mer… Gollner’s passion for fruit is infectious, and his fascinating book is a testament to the fact that there is much more to the world of fruit than the bland varieties on our supermarket shelves.”
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Kirkus Reviews

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The Fruit Hunters

“An informative, enlightening account of fruits and their role in human life… [Gollner] explores a mind-boggling array of fruits—including Rudolph Hass’s avocadoes, Ah Bing’s cherries and the foreign-weirdo-turned-megafruit kiwi… He brings us into the worlds of growers, wholesalers, marketers, agricultural officials, smugglers and branders. “Every time we eat a fruit, we’re tasting forgotten histories,” he writes, recounting how fruits have fueled wars, inspired religious worship, led to group sex and caused sensations [such as] the outbreak of pear mania in 19th-century America.”

NPR

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Miracle Mystery Fruit Turns Sourness Sweet

“It’s a tiny berry. But it works miracles when you eat it before sour foods. Lemons instantly turn from sour to sweet. Even a bologna sandwich turns to cake. In this interview, author Adam Leith Gollner provides a history of the berry.”
Listen Here

Cabinet Magazine

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Sweet Tart: An Interview with Adam Leith Gollner

“In 1974, under rather strange circumstances, the FDA banned miracle fruit and all its derivative products. Adam Leith Gollner’s forthcoming book on “the fruit underworld” examines the short, unhappy life of miracle fruit in the US. Sina Najafi spoke to him by phone.”
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Zink Magazine

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The Fruit Hunters

“Informative, quirky and enormously fun to read, The Fruit Hunters is Montreal-based musician and writer Adam Leith Gollner’s debut book. He explores the fruit world – from the exotic to the banal, the nutritious to the medicinal. There’s even an underworld of forbidden fruits just oozing with juicy tales behind our seemingly innocent choices.”
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Both Hands

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The Fruit Hunters

“A fascinating read! This book makes me want to travel to far-away places just to eat exotic fruits. And it makes me incredibly annoyed at the paltry selection that we have here in the United States. Why don’t we have the ice cream bean? Why are we denied the miracle fruit, which makes sour things taste amazingly sweet? It turns out fruit is tied to all sorts of political nonsense, but that doesn’t keep people from constantly trying to bring better fruit to the Western World…”
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Gothamist

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Covert Dining in New York: Miracle Fruit

“The active ingredient in miracle fruit, or miraculin, is an ordinary glycoprotein molecule with some trailing carbohydrate chains which somehow change the way our tongue perceives taste. The effect, which wears off in a few hours, “isn’t like sugar, because [miraculin] isn’t exactly a sweetener,” Gollner says. “It’s an elusive, illusory effect that depends on what you eat afterwards…”
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WSJ

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Make Lemons
 Into Lemonade,
Try ‘Miracle Fruit’

“After languishing in obscurity since the 1970s, miracle fruit, or Synsepalum dulcificum, is enjoying a small renaissance. In-the-know food lovers from Hawaii to Finland are seeking out the berry as a culinary curiosity… A French explorer known as the Chevalier des Marchais first encountered the effects in 1725 somewhere in West Africa, says Adam Gollner, who is writing a book about miracle fruit. The chevalier saw villagers eat the berry before consuming gruel and palm wine, so he gave it a try himself.”
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Blueberry Fool

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Miracle Fruit

“The amazing Miracle Fruit was seemingly lost in the shuffle of colonialism, and was later tested by the U.S. Army and several pharmaceutical giants before being rejected suddenly by the FDA in 1974, under mysterious, X-Files type circumstances (a “high speed car chase;” “men in sunglasses”). Gollner is working on a book examining the “fruit underworld,” including the sad odyssey of the Miracle Fruit…”
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Strut Magazine

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Drop that Fruit!

“On customs declarations, lodged between important meat and dairy considerations, there’s a small, hard-to-notice question about bringing fruit into the country. Everybody always checks the “NO” box, but there’s a reason that question is asked. Some fruits are illegal. In the US, getting caught with a pitahaya, a durian or a loquat is a felony punishable by law…”
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The Montreal Gazette

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Mouth-Watering Read

“Adam Gollner, a writer who contributed several articles to Gourmet’s Montreal issue, said he loves the fact the city has managed to preserve its small neighborhood joints even as it experiences an explosion in the quality and number of high-end restaurants. “I love this place on Clarke St. called Niukee,” he said. “The owner is an opera singer and every Tuesday she hosts the meeting of an opera society at the restaurant… To eat is to celebrate life, and that’s one of the things we do best here in Montreal.”

Ukula

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On the Set of Goblin Market

“Right now, I’m working on turning mathematical equations into human language. I also make balsa wood rafts.”
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The New York Times

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A Remake of a Charity Song, by the Elite of Indie Rock

“We respect Band Aid’s ability to raise so much money for relief efforts, but their lyrics seem so misguided and inappropriate,” Mr. Gollner, 28, a member of the band Dessert, wrote in an e-mail message. “Africa isn’t a land ‘where nothing ever grows’ and ‘no rain nor river flows.’ And how are lines such as ‘Well tonight thank God it’s them instead of you’ supposed to be helpful?”
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The Montreal Gazette

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Tongue-In-Cheek Look at Halloween

“We’re working to save the lives of children. Having the voice of popular music is incredibly important,” says UNICEF Quebec executive Evelyne Guindon. “I’m so proud as a Montrealer that this great energy is coming from our city.”
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Maclean’s

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Brave Men Dare to Ask

“We’ve been getting concerned messages from thehalloweennetwork.com,” says Gollner. “They are people who are into Halloween all year round. They sent an email saying, ‘Could you please clarify your anti-Halloween activities to our five million viewers.’ So Elvira has been defending the song in cyberspace.”
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Vice Magazine

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Scaritable Donations

“The Arcade Fire happened to be in L.A., so they came over while fending off armies of orgasming record-label execs. Karen O made us sit outside while she recorded; then, gone in a flash, she forgot her bong in our car. Malcolm McLaren asked to come record his part at 7:30 AM: “Not the most rock and roll time of the day,” he acknowledged in full Cockney. Before long, we were driving to Detroit to meet 60s soul legend Gino Washington in his 9-Mile kitchen.”
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The Montreal Gazette

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Piano’s On Fire, Pants are Off

“In Quebec, all these teenage boys and girls came to the stage and started pulling our pants off. Of course, that was after we set the piano on fire…”
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The Montreal Mirror

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Molecular Spectacular

“It is like biting into a nouvelle vague peach. Our sound is the beauty of geometric abstraction. It is gilded lace in a world of bitter, salted tears. Our music is a gossamer loincloth in a dark cave of minotaurs. Truth be told, our music is a smoky, impenetrable fortress.”
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