Sucking Eggs

Ambitious and systematic… she has made a serious study of government-imposed austerity in the Forties – David Sexton * Evening Standard *Charming and perceptive romp through the ration books… Much of the book’s fun is in the deft way Nicol weaves together examples of can-do thrifty propaganda. She has trawled the Imperial War Museum and the National Archives and come up with some gems – Bee Wilson * Sunday Times *Fascinating slice of social history… With painstaking research, a good helping of north-east commonsense and glorious illustrations taken from Ministry of Information posters from the 1930s and ‘40s, she demonstrates how this generation could learn a lot from the self-sacrifice and austerity of the war years * Aberdeen Press and Journal *A fascinating book * Big Issue *A comparative history of rationing, ‘making do’ and the environmentally-friendly lessons we can learn from those post-war years * Choice Magazine *In our age of unprecedented consumption and limited resources, our grannies can show us the way to a total lifestyle change * Irish Examiner *Illustrated throughout with jaunty, witty government posters… Nicol wants our latter-day green movement to look back and learn a thing or two from forgotten habits of the past’ – Mary Blanche Ridge * The Tablet *Good old granny! Here’s what she could teach today’s throw-away society with its gas-guzzlers, bulging wardrobes and waistlines… When it comes to going green, our wartime grannies showed us the way * Unite *Get a copy…and find out what your war-time granny can teach you about going green * Irish Times *Charming and perceptive romp through the ration books… It is apparent that Nicol, whose words exude practical optimism, would have made a good Land Girl. * The Sunday Times *

Patricia Nicol is a journalist. She was born in Aberdeen in 1971, and brought up in Scotland, the UAE, England and Brazil. She studied English at the University of York and newspaper journalism at Cardiff Journalism School, University of Wales. As a journalist she has worked for the Aberdeen Press and Journal, the Scotsman and the Sunday Times, where she was deputy editor of Culture. She lives in London.

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