I write well-researched literary fiction with an ecological focus. Before becoming a biomedical editor, I did clinical research for a leading academic medical center in Cleveland, OH. However, it was only by working at a research institution – and becoming a patient there – that I realized how much science overlooks; it’s only one way of knowing about something. Another way is by building relationships – including with non-human beings. It’s not just people who are complex. Every living thing exists within an intricate, nuanced ecosystem. This sort of knowing, built over long periods, is what facilitates understanding, compassion, and respect for other beings. These are the qualities I hope to share through my writing.
Winona Heeley spent the last year of recovery from eating disorders in rural Japan, at Michikusa House, alongside one other full-time resident: Jun Nakashima. Like Winona, Jun was a recovering addict and college dropout. While they bonded over rituals of growing their own food and preparing meals, they changed each other’s lives by reconstructing long-held beliefs about shame, identity, and renewal. But after Winona returns to her Midwest hometown, Jun vanishes.
Two years pass and Winona, seeking revival through gardening, accepts a job as a groundskeeper at a local cemetery…and begins searching for Jun Nakashima once more.
Braiding Sweetgrass is a poetic invitation to reconnect with the more-than-human world through a series of lovingly crafted essays.
Given my own scientific background, I deeply appreciated how the author, Robin Wall Kimmerer, blends her own research as a bryologist (moss expert) with the ancient wisdom of her indigenous heritage. Both ways of knowing – science and indigenous understanding – offer insight into how we, as average people, might repair our broken relationship with the natural world.
I always recommend readers listen to the audiobook, read by the author; she has the most calming voice and I find myself soothed by her words. Plus, she can pronounce all the terminology, both scientific and indigenous. This book is a one-of-a-kind gem, one I revisit whenever I’m feeling frazzled, anxious, or unhopeful.
Called the work of "a mesmerizing storyteller with deep compassion and memorable prose" (Publishers Weekly) and the book that, "anyone interested in natural history, botany, protecting nature, or Native American culture will love," by Library Journal, Braiding Sweetgrass is poised to be a classic of nature writing. As a botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer asks questions of nature with the tools of science. As a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, she embraces indigenous teachings that consider plants and animals to be our oldest teachers. Kimmerer brings these two lenses of knowledge together to take "us on a journey that is…
Islands of Abandonment shares extraordinary examples of nature’s ability to reclaim – and restore – land abused by humans.
In startling vignettes, the author visits numerous abandoned sites, uninhabited by humans for different reasons: from Chernobyl to a no man's land on the island of Cyprus, to factories simply rendered obsolete leaving the surrounding neighborhoods blighted, dangerous and often empty.
I found this book to be, if not hopeful, then cautiously optimistic in its affirmation of nature’s resilience, even in the wake of massive destruction. Cal Flyn’s writing is enviably good: keenly observant, capturing intimate details about these landscapes and the non-human beings who inhabit them in vivid detail.
Unforgettable and illuminating. This is nature writing and investigative journalism at its best.
A beautiful, lyrical exploration of the places where nature is flourishing in our absence
"[Flyn] captures the dread, sadness, and wonder of beholding the results of humanity's destructive impulse, and she arrives at a new appreciation of life, 'all the stranger and more valuable for its resilence.'" --The New Yorker
Some of the only truly feral cattle in the world wander a long-abandoned island off the northernmost tip of Scotland. A variety of wildlife not seen in many lifetimes has rebounded on the irradiated grounds of Chernobyl. A lush forest supports thousands of species that are extinct or endangered everywhere…
Prodigal Summer is a poignant novel that interweaves three unforgettable stories of humans’ interdependency with nature.
A wildlife biologist and land steward excitedly sites coyotes on her forested turf; two neighbors feuding over the use of herbicides; and a former “bug expert” turned widowed farmer’s wife. I admire how these fictious tales offer keen-eyed examples of how stories centered around nature can be braided into everyday fiction.
Set in Appalachia, this novel also celebrates an underappreciated corner of our country (too many books are set in New York, in my opinion). As a novelist, Barbara Kingsolver’s books are among my greatest role models.
It is summer in the Appalachian mountains and love, desire and attraction are in the air. Nature, too, it seems, is not immune. From her outpost in an isolated mountain cabin, Deanna Wolfe, a reclusive wildlife biologist, watches a den of coyotes that have recently migrated into the region. She is caught off guard by a young hunter who invades her most private spaces and interrupts her self-assured, solitary life. On a farm several miles down the mountain, Lusa Maluf Landowski, a bookish city girl turned farmer's wife, finds herself marooned in a strange place where she must declare or…
In The Dolphin House, author Audrey Shulman helped me form an extraordinary bond with one species in particular: dolphins.
Although this remarkable novel is based on a true story about a bizarre 1960s experiment, what caught my attention upfront was the fact that the main character, Cora, is partially deaf. Few authors incorporate people with different abilities in their writing, let alone make them a focal point.
Shulman takes this a step further, making Cora’s “disability” the trait that helps her understand and empathize with the four dolphins in her care. The writing is swift and confident; the story, engrossing.
Based on the true story of the 1965 “dolphin house” experiment, this spellbinding novel captures the tenor of the social experiments of the 1960s in award-winning author Audrey Schulman’s tightly paced and evocative style.
It is 1965, and Cora, a young, hearing impaired woman, buys a one-way ticket to the island of St. Thomas, where she discovers four dolphins held in captivity as part of an experiment led by the obsessive Dr. Blum. Drawn by a strong connection to the dolphins, Cora falls in with the scientists and discovers her need to protect the animals.
The Forest Unseen approaches the natural world with both eyes wide open.
It is the book I turn to when I crave a spiritual lift; it helps me shed the mindset of modern conveniences and striving, drawing me out of doors. David George Haskell writes with unparalleled precision, examining what goes on in one small patch of old growth forest over the course of a year. What he observes seems, well, a lot like magic.
Reading this book, I can’t help but be amazed by life’s abundance, its strangeness, and its never-ending cycles that are blessedly disinterested in the goings on of humans. The Forest Unseen is both a breath of fresh air and a meditation.
A biologist reveals the secret world hidden in a single square meter of old-growth forest--a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the Pen/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award
Look out for David Haskell's new book, The Songs of Tree: Stories From Nature's Great Connectors, coming in April of 2017
In this wholly original book, biologist David Haskell uses a one- square-meter patch of old-growth Tennessee forest as a window onto the entire natural world. Visiting it almost daily for one year to trace nature's path through the seasons, he brings the forest and its inhabitants to vivid life.
I have been writing all my life, but was never able to find my voice until I had my daughters. It was for them I wrote “Wrightsville Beach”. I wanted to show them what a good relationship should look like and how their decisions make a difference in where they will go. I want my readers to relive that feeling of falling in love and to be sent in unexpected directions, as life so often does to us. I want you to enjoy it so much, you don’t want to put the book down until it’s finished and once you do, to sit and reflect on it, savoring the feeling it has left behind.
Two years ago, devastated by the sudden death of his older brother, Hank Atwater went on a drinking rampage that ended in his being arrested. Since then, he has been working to rebuild his reputation in his hometown of Wilmington, North Carolina, with little luck. But everything changes after a chance meeting with Jess Wade, a UNCW student studying to be a marine biologist. Hank and Jess feel connected to each other in a way neither has ever felt before.
But when Hank’s past leads to a frightful incident, it ends their relationship. Jess leaves to work on the beach with sea turtles, thinking about what really happened that summer with Hank, while Hank sets out to find his own path in hopes of one day winning her back.
Two years ago, Hank Atwater made a terrible mistake. Devastated by the sudden death of his older brother, Rob, he went on a drinking rampage that ended in his being arrested for aggravated assault. Sober since then, he has been working to rebuild his reputation in his hometown of Wilmington, North Carolina, with little luck.
Working a dead-end delivery job, Hank uses surfing and running to deal with being ostracized as he waits for his probation to end. But everything changes after a chance meeting with Jess Wade, a UNCW student studying to be a marine biologist. Hank and Jess…
Interested in
indigenous peoples,
farms,
and
Tennessee?
11,000+ authors have recommended their favorite books and what they love about them.
Browse their picks for the best books about
indigenous peoples,
farms,
and
Tennessee.
