Zackary Vernon, Author
When Zackary Vernon moved to Boone to begin teaching at Appalachian State University, he took on the personal challenge of trying to make ethical food choices: gardening, raising chickens, buying food from local farmers and volunteering at a certified organic farm. “These efforts often felt gratifying, like I was moving in the right direction,” he says. “But sometimes I doubted whether my personal choices were making a difference, or I felt disillusioned by extremist positions on both the right and the left that seemed unfeasible for most Americans.”
Although Boone became the case study for his exploration of food, this book is relevant everywhere. “While there are no easy answers, I invite readers to consider their own responsibilities to both the places they live and the far-off places their lifestyles affect,” he says.
“And, hopefully, I offer ways for us, if not to succeed, then at least to fail better both because of emerging sustainable practices and because of radical shifts in thinking that are necessary as we try to eat more ethically in the future.”
Boone, he says, is well-positioned in considerations of food justice, boasting “a wealth of farmers, restaurateurs, scholars, writers and activists who are working to create a more equitable food system. I believe this place has much to teach us about resilience in the face of seemingly insurmountable problems.”
Eating on a Mountain at the End of the World: How I Found Love, Humor, and Beauty in My Quest for Ethical Food, June 2026, nonfiction, trade paperback, $19.99, by Zackary Vernon, and published by The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, NC. Vernon will attend the Juniper Bends Reading Series in Asheville on Friday, June 12. Learn more at ZackaryVernon.com.
