Schlosser isn't opposed to the concept of fast food per se. He includes examples of fast-food pioneers who marched to their own individualist beat, such as Carl Karcher, the founder of the Carl's Jr. chain. Karcher is no Alice Waters, but his example shows the value of stubborn hard work and honest business practices. Karcher's blindness to the downside of the fast-food revolution in which he played a part seems to come more from a sort of tone-deafness than from greed.

Even in the book's gross-out section on food safety, Schlosser concedes that, so far, the slaughterhouse conditions he documents present no widespread health threat. And the book ends with what can only be called a tribute to In N Out Burger of California, a family-owned chain that has refused to franchise and pays the highest wages in the fast-food industry. In N Out peels its own potatoes and uses fresh beef, and it does without microwaves, heat lamps and freezers. It's ranked first in the nation in food quality, service and atmosphere, and the most expensive thing on the menu costs $2.45.

So what can be done to break the grip that the rest of the fast-food industry has on us? In a brief section titled "What to Do," Schlosser sketches possible remedies. He wants to see some action by government, including a single food safety agency, higher standards for food safety in school cafeterias and a ban on advertising "unhealthy foods to children," which might then cause McDonald's, for example, to lower the fat content of its Happy Meals, and thus make a dent down the road in the trend toward obesity. He also suggests eliminating job-training subsidies for fast-food chains that churn through workers and don't actually help them acquire any skills, as well as "passing new laws to faciliate union organizing" at these chains, which he admits might not lead to widespread unionizing but would encourage the industry to treat workers better.

His final appeal to end the fast-food industry's bid for domination, however, is aimed not at government but at consumers: "Turn and walk out the door," he encourages, the next time you're about to buy fast food.

As a reader -- and an eater -- I'm Schlosser's perfect audience. I consume my share of hamburgers, but rarely at a fast-food chain, unless I'm starving and trapped on Interstate 95. I'm probably as turned off by the nutritional vacuum fast food represents as I am by the specter of automaton minimum-wage staffers reciting their "Would you like to supersize that?" scripts. So why did I get a sinking feeling as this altogether reasonable, well-researched and heartfelt book ended? Why do I doubt that Schlosser will end up changing many minds not already sympathetic to his point, let alone alter much behavior? I think the main problem is Schlosser's appeal to cold, hard reason rather than enlightened appetite.

He's right that it's important to try to change public opinion about acceptable corporate behavior, especially when corporations are using shady practices to control an activity as intimate and as central to our overall well-being as eating. But Schlosser has left out a discussion of what needs to replace all those fast-food meals -- the kinds of fresh foods that would be affordable, accessible and familiar enough to override Americans' daily cravings for fries, burgers and other processed, taste-engineered foods. And he doesn't even approach the question of what it will take for a healthier and more varied way of eating to win over the low-income people who are the captive market for fast food right now.

The improvement of the American diet in this age of rampant obesity is a complicated socioeconomic problem, but it's partly a question of changing tastes, of educating palates -- and making no apologies, regardless of the implied snobbery of the project. Surely, "Let them eat In N Out Double Doubles" can't be the only answer. Schlosser has certainly made his case, and we'd be fools to ignore him. But in the end, I found myself wishing that "Fast Food Nation" had tried to appeal more to the stomach than to the brain.

Maya Angelou reads from "The Heart of a Woman"