Tea
With a personal love for
Camellia sinensis, Eliot has studied tea in all its forms. It wakes, warms, cools, relaxes, propels— is there anything tea can't do?
Some questions to ponder over your next cup of tea:
- Why would people travel halfway around the world and back, just for a leaf that has almost no nutritional value?
- Why would some risk their lives and spend years trying to steal the techniques of growing and processing it?
- How many fortunes were made or lost chasing after tea?
- How many wars were fought to control it?
- How many plants have inspired ceramics, races, artwork, poetry, migrations, revolutions, even religions?
In the forthcoming novel
THREE TURNS OF THE SUNs, there is an analogous plant that does all of the above. Which is why it should not be considered exactly fantasy...