THE CLASSIC THAT LAUNCHED THE ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT
Rachel Carson is a pivotal figure of the twentieth century...people who thought one way before her essential 1962 book Silent Spring thought another way after it.--Margaret Atwood
Rarely does a single book alter the course of history, but Rachel Carson's Silent Spring did exactly that. The outcry that followed its publication in 1962 forced the banning of DDT and spurred revolutionary changes in the laws affecting our air, land, and water. Carson's passionate concern for the future of our planet reverberated powerfully throughout the world. As Carson reminds us, In nature, nothing exists alone.
The introduction by the acclaimed biographer Linda Lear, author of Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature, tells the story of Carson's courageous defense of her truths in the face of a ruthless assault form the chemical industry following the publication of Silent Spring and before her untimely death.
Wonder and humility are just some of the gifts of Silent Spring. They remind us that we, like all other living creatures, are part of the vast ecosystems of the earth of the earth...this is a book to relish: not for the dark side of human nature, but for the promise of life's possibility. --from the Introduction
How Silent Spring stands as a monument to a unique, loving relationship between Rachel Carson and Dorothy Freeman, and how such love underpins a new environmental politics
After the success of her first bestseller, The Sea Around Us, Rachel Carson settled in Southport, Maine. The married couple Dorothy and Stanley Freeman had a cottage nearby, and the trio quickly became friends. Their extensive and evocative correspondence shows that Dorothy and Rachel did something more: they fell in love.
In this moving new book, Lida Maxwell explores their letters to reveal how Carson's masterpiece, Silent Spring, grew from the love these women shared for their wild surroundings and, vitally and increasingly, for each other. Carson had already demonstrated a profound environmental awareness by the time she purchased her home in Maine; Maxwell proposes that it took her love for Dorothy to open up a more powerful space for critique. As their love unsettled their heteronormative ideas of bourgeois life, it enabled Carson to develop an increasingly critical view of capitalism and its effects on nonhuman nature and human lives alike, and it was this evolution that made the advocacy of Silent Spring possible.
In Rachel Carson and the Power of Queer Love, Silent Spring's exposé of the dangerous and loveless exhaustion of nature for capitalism's ends is set in bold relief against the lovers' correspondence, in which we see the path toward a more loving use of nature and a transformative political desire that, Maxwell argues, should inform our approach to contemporary environmental crises.
From the 2022 TIME100 Next honoree and the activist who coined the term comes a primer on intersectional environmentalism for the next generation of activists looking to create meaningful, inclusive, and sustainable change.
The Intersectional Environmentalist examines the inextricable link between environmentalism, racism, and privilege, and promotes awareness of the fundamental truth that we cannot save the planet without uplifting the voices of its people -- especially those most often unheard. Written by Leah Thomas, a prominent voice in the field and the activist who coined the term Intersectional Environmentalism, this book is simultaneously a call to action, a guide to instigating change for all, and a pledge to work towards the empowerment of all people and the betterment of the planet. Thomas shows how not only are Black, Indigenous and people of color unequally and unfairly impacted by environmental injustices, but she argues that the fight for the planet lies in tandem to the fight for civil rights; and in fact, that one cannot exist without the other. An essential read, this book addresses the most pressing issues that the people and our planet face, examines and dismantles privilege, and looks to the future as the voice of a movement that will define a generation.How do we live with fire? From the creator of The California Field Atlas, a book of stewardship, resilience, and hope.
Fire is an essential part of California's ecology. Humans have been using it to shape the California landscape for thousands of years. But today many Californians' relationship to fire is one of fear. Obi Kaufmann, author of the best-selling California Field Atlas, now asks: How do we live with fire? What makes fire essential to a healthy and biodiverse Golden State, and how do we benefit from its teachings? With the same solution-minded ethic as his much-admired The State of Water: Understanding California's Most Precious Resource, Kaufmann presents fire as a force of regeneration rather than apocalypse. He considers the long history of ecological burns, the varied ways fire behaves across the state, and the lessons we can learn from California's largest fires of recent decades.
Packed with Kaufmann's signature watercolor maps and paintings, The State of Fire confronts one of California's most pressing social and ecological challenges. From this maelstrom Kaufmann emerges to share a deepened love for the natural world--and a refreshingly hopeful vision of California's future.
Trash Can Joe - Wardens pursue an infamous, outlaw hunting-guide who uses donuts to illegally bait bears. Meet The Black Robinhood.
Callous Hearts - A rogue band of meth-cooking deer poachers meets with misfortune.
Rascal's Road to Justice - The world's greatest duck caller, as a renowned waterfowl violator bills himself, crows that he's too smart to be caught. His education to the contrary soon follows.
True Remorse - One of the coldest of the cold, cold hearts, pays a heavy price for extreme cruelty to a trapped bear.
Turkeys - The wardens meet a hardened criminal whose hobbies are turkey hunting and home-invasion robberies.
A Weekend with Starsky and Hutch. - A swashbuckling pair of wardens cram a fourth-story, roof-to-roof foot chase in old San Francisco and heroic rescues from burning buildings into a single, memorable weekend.
The Natural - A young woman proves that she was born to be a Fish and Game warden.
Dirty Harry and Ape Island - A warden thinks his way out of a jam in this story that features a good-humored Highway Patrol sergeant and an ill-humored monkey.
Lucky Breaks - A warden demonstrates his substantial tracking skills to put away an outlaw houndsman who traffics in bear gallbladders.
Lobster Jake - An infamous lobster pirate teams with The Muppet, a character straight out of a nightmare.
Cold, Cold Hearts - A California warden, at great risk to himself, flies to Alaska to help state troopers there deal with a team of highly dangerous, cruel and destructive grizzly poachers.
Deep Water is a major achievement....Bradley's skills both as novelist and essayist converge here to create this wise, compassionate and urgent book, characterized throughout by a clarity of prose and a bracing moral gaze that searches water, self and reader. --ROBERT MACFARLANE, bestselling author of Underland
In this thrilling work--a blend of history, science, nature writing, and environmentalism--acclaimed writer James Bradley plunges into the unknown to explore the deepest recesses of the natural world.
Seventy-one percent of the earth's surface is ocean. These waters created, shaped, and continue to sustain not just human life, but all life on Planet Earth, and perhaps beyond it. They serve as the stage for our cultural history--driving human development from evolution through exploration, colonialism, and the modern era of global leisure and trade. They are also the harbingers of the future--much of life on Earth cannot survive if sea levels are too low or too high, temperatures too cold or too warm. Our oceans are vast spaces of immense wonder and beauty, and our relationship to them is innate and awe inspired.
Deep Water is both a lyrically written personal meditation and an intriguing wide-ranging reported epic that reckons with our complex connection to the seas. It is a story shaped by tidal movements and deep currents, lit by the insights of philosophers, scientists, artists and other great minds. Bradley takes readers from the atomic creation of the oceans, to the wonders within, such as fish migrations guided by electromagnetic sensing. He describes the impacts of human population shifts by boat and speaks directly and uncompromisingly to the environmental catastrophe that is already impacting our lives. It is also a celebration of the ocean's glories and the extraordinary efforts of the scientists and researchers who are unlocking its secrets. These myriad strands are woven together into a tapestry of life that captures not only our relationship with the planet, but our past, and perhaps most importantly, what lies ahead for us.
A brilliant blend of Robert MacFarlane's Underland, Susan Casey's The Underworld, and Simon Winchester's Pacific and The Atlantic, Deep Water taps into the essence of our planet and who we are.
A New York Times Editors' Choice
Delivers everything its title promises and much more. - NPR
Remarkable... Every species, and every person who fights for its continued existence, deserves a book like this. -- The New York Times
This nail-biter account has the intensity of the best true crime... A high-def tale that ensnares you from the start. --People
David Grann meets Susan Orlean in this page-turning true story of an underground operation into the mysterious world of alligator poaching and its larger than life Floridian characters
Across more than a dozen acclaimed works of fiction, readers have become intimate with Lydia Millet's distinctive voice and sly wit. We Loved It All, her first nonfiction book, combines the precision of fact with the power of narrative to evoke our enmeshment with the more-than-human world.
Emerging from Millet's quarter century of wildlife and climate advocacy, We Loved it All marries scenes from her life with moments of nearness to the others-- the animals and plants with whom we share the earth. Accounts of fears and failures, jobs and friendships, childhood and motherhood are interspersed with exquisite accounts of nonhumans and arresting meditations on the power of story to shape the future.
Seeking to understand why we immerse ourselves in the domestic and immediate, turning away from more sweeping views, she examines how grand cultural myths can deny our longing for the company of nature and deprive us of its charisma and inspiration. In a thrilling distillation of experience and emotion, she evinces the familiar sense of feeling both well-meaning and powerless--a creature subject to forces that are baffling in their immensity. The fear and grief of extinction and climate change, Millet suggests, are forms of love that might be turned to resistance.
We Loved It All shimmers with curiosity and laconic humor yet addresses with reverence the most urgent crises of our day. An incantatory, bewitching devotional to the vast and precious bestiary of the earth, it asks that we extend to other living beings the protection they deserve--the simple grace of continued existence.
The Sacred Balance has a beautiful spirit.--E.O. Wilson
With a new foreword from Robin Wall Kimmerer, New York Times-bestselling author of Braiding Sweetgrass--and an afterword from Bill McKibben--this special 25th anniversary edition of a beloved bestseller invites readers to see ourselves as part of nature, not separate.
The world is changing at a relentless pace. How can we slow down and act from a place of respect for all living things? The Sacred Balance shows us how.
In this extensively updated new edition, David Suzuki reflects on the increasingly radical changes in science and nature--from the climate crisis to peak oil and the rise in clean energy--and examines what they mean for humankind. He also reflects on what we have learned by listening to Indigenous leaders, whose knowledge of the natural world is profound, and whose peoples are on the frontlines of protecting land and water around the world.
Drawing on his own experiences and those of others who have put their beliefs into action, The Sacred Balance combines science, philosophy, spirituality, and Indigenous knowledge to offer concrete suggestions for creating an ecologically sustainable future by rediscovering and addressing humanity's basic needs.
Published in Partnership with the David Suzuki Institute
Deep down, there is just something that draws us to the land, to wild places. We were there to listen to the land.
When National Geographic Adventurers of the Year Amy and Dave Freeman marry, they set out on an unusual honeymoon: a three-year, 12,000-mile journey across North America. From Alaska's Inside Passage to Florida's Key West, they traverse the continent by kayak, canoe, dogsled, and skis, encountering wildlife, sublime landscapes, and harrowing challenges.
Along the way, the Freemans also bear witness to environmental degradation and climate change--from plastic-covered beaches to forest fires to retreating glaciers. And as they engage with Native and rural communities most impacted by the changes resulting from modern industrial society and meet individuals and organizations dedicated to protecting the natural world, their adventure deepens in ways they never imagined.
From the white-knuckle rush of paddling white water to the wonderment of dogsledding across a frosted landscape where caribou and wolves roam, North American Odyssey is a celebration of our interconnectedness to the natural world and to each other. Beautifully written, engagingly told, and inspiring throughout, Amy and Dave Freeman's story is a clarion call for change in the way we live.
Loving the North Woods is a chronicle of the difficult challenges that led to tremendous conservation achievements in the great North Woods of Maine. Focusing on the remarkable period of activity from 1990 to 2015, during which historic achievements in American conservation unfolded, it explores how people love a place and how they bring that love into action. The stories of conservation in Maine's North Woods, hidden in files of land trusts, state government archives, forest landowners' records, and in the memories of those who participated, can inspire and guide us now and far into the future.
National Outdoor Book Award Winner
Delve into this fascinating appreciation of milkweed, an often-overlooked plant, and discover an amazing range of insects and organisms that depend on it as the seasons unfold, with this collaboration between a noted ecologist and an award-winning botanical illustrator. Ecologist Eric Lee-Mäder and noted botanical artist Beverly Duncan have teamed up to create this unique exploration of the complex ecosystem that is supported by the remarkable milkweed plant, often over-looked or dismissed as a roadside weed. With stunning, up-close illustrations and engaging text, they trace every stage of the plant's changes and evolutions throughout the seasons, including germination, growth, flowering, and seed development. Simultaneously, they chronicle the lives of the many creatures whose lives are intertwined with the milkweed: monarch butterflies; soldier and queen butterflies; milkweed tussock moths; large and small milkweed bugs; milkweed weevils; bumble bees; goldfinches; and more. The delightful illustrations and illuminating text give the reader the feeling of browsing an avid naturalist's sketchbook, while also learning about different milkweed species, how to propagate milkweed in the garden, the industrial uses of milkweed, interesting milkweed relatives, and more.What does it mean to be a parent in the age of climate change?
We are living in an era of climate collapse. We feel it in small ways: when the snow falls less or the cherry blossoms bloom too early. And in large ways: when our streets flood and entire towns burn to the ground. Climate anxiety touches nearly everything we do, but perhaps nothing so intimately as our parenting. It leaves an impossible task for those of us raising children. What do we tell our kids when the air quality is too bad to go ride bikes? What skills will they need if systems collapse? And what do we do with the fear, grief, and anger we feel as parents?
Parent, activist, and writer Lydia Wylie-Kellermann wrestles with these questions and dares to argue that while the future remains unknown, there is still awe and wonder, love and struggle, gratitude and overwhelming joy to be found. As we raise our children toward this uncertain future, Wylie-Kellermann helps us see that those same children shift our posture, slow us down, and invite us to fall in love with the ground on which we stand. At this turning point in humanity, we can choose to shift our lives away from death-dealing profit systems toward life-giving, generous systems. Here is the moment when we must choose to fight like hell for climate justice. And we can do it by nurturing a deeper relationship with this sweet earth in all its beauty, wonder, and wisdom, walking alongside our children.