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Nature
Mountain biking presents unique challenges, and noted expert Joe Friel addresses them all in his latest book. Covering every aspect of training, he helps riders maximize their experience and minimize problems.
An anthology of mountain-inspired literature. It features folktales, myths, essays, travelogues, and poetry of both ancient and modern times. It features the mountain experiences that range from the altitude-induced vision of Simon Bolivar atop Mount Chimborazo, to a Victorian-era pleasure trip in the Alps.
A great hero of America's conservation movement, John Muir (1838-1914) was active in establishing the Yosemite Valley as a protected national park and in awakening interest in the importance of safeguarding natural resources. In this tribute to the grandeur of the Sierras, Muir recounts his journeys by foot through the Yosemite Valley, Mount Whitney, the famed sequoia forests, King's Canyon, and other wilderness areas.
With a natural historian's keen eye for flora, geography, and geology, Muir describes glaciers, lakes, trees, and the daily lives of the region's inhabitants. His lyrical narrative, imbued with the deepest understanding and respect for nature, examines the ways in which natural forces shape the landscape and the effects of the changing seasons. The zesty travelogue is accompanied by splendid illustrations of maps, plants, and animals. Originally published in 1894, The Mountains of California continues to delight and inform readers.
With a natural historian's keen eye for flora, geography, and geology, Muir describes glaciers, lakes, trees, and the daily lives of the region's inhabitants. His lyrical narrative, imbued with the deepest understanding and respect for nature, examines the ways in which natural forces shape the landscape and the effects of the changing seasons. The zesty travelogue is accompanied by splendid illustrations of maps, plants, and animals. Originally published in 1894, The Mountains of California continues to delight and inform readers.
A flock of birds, even a skein of geese perhaps -- but a cete of badgers, or a grist of bees? The collective nouns of animals and birds have long inspired and intrigued us. Many have their roots in medieval times, in particular applied to those creatures hunted by man, and subject to the etiquette of their proper group names. Author Steve Palin has beautifully illustrated and given the background to about fifty different animals and birds with interesting collective nouns -- and listed 420 of them in his glossary. This elegant little book will appeal to all those with a fascination for the English language, those who want the answers for quizzes and crossword puzzles, and those with an interest in animals and birds.
In the summer of 1869, John Muir made his first long trip to Yosemite. When a friend offered him the chance to accompany his flock of sheep and a shepherd to the high pastures of the Sierra, it was an opportunity Muir could not resist. My First Summer in the Sierra is the journal he kept of those summer days, of the wildlife and plant life, and of his explorations into the magical places of the mountains.
John Muir's beloved adventure in the Sierra reissued to entertain, encourage, and inspire contemporary naturalists.
Considered one of the patron saints of twentieth-century environmental activity, John Muir's appeal to modern readers is that he not only explored the American West but also fought for its preservation. My First Summer in the Sierra is Muir's account of his adventures and observations while working as a shepherd in the Yosemite Valley, which later became Yosemite National Park as a direct result of Muir's writings and activism. Muir's heartfelt and often humorous descriptions of his first summer spent in the Sierra will captivate and inspire long-time fans and novice naturalists alike.
John Muir was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States, and founder of The Sierra Club. His letters, essays, and books of his adventures in nature have been read by millions.
"Lively writing about science and nature depends less on the offering of good answers, I think, than on the offering of good questions," said David Quammen in the original introduction to Natural Acts. For more than two decades, he has stuck to that credo. In this updated version of curiosity leads him from New Mexico to Romania, from the Congo to the Amazon, asking questions about mosquitoes (what are their redeeming merits?), dinosaurs (how did they change the life of a dyslexic Vietnam vet?), and cloning (can it save endangered species?).
This revised and expanded edition best-loved "Natural Acts" columns, which first appeared in Outside magazine in the early 1980s, and includes recent pieces such as "Planet of Weeds," an influential new Natural Acts is an eye-opening journey that will please both Quammen fans and newcomers to his work.
Diane Ackerman's lusciously written grand tour of the realm of the senses includes conversations with an iceberg in Antarctica and a professional nose in New York, along with dissertations on kisses and tattoos, sadistic cuisine and the music played by the planet Earth. "Delightful . . . gives the reader the richest possible feeling of the worlds the senses take in." --The New York Times
An essential and timely collection of wise and compelling essays from one of the longtime leaders of the sustainable agriculture movement in America. Wes Jackson, "a well-known and admired advocate for sustainability especially as it relates to agriculture, has the rare ability to transform his convictions into captivating prose . . . Jackson's thoughts are still as significant and profound as they were nearly 20 years ago" (Publishers Weekly) and can teach us many things about the land, soil, and conservation, but what most resonates is this: The ecosphere is self-regulating, and as often as we attempt to understand it, we are not its builders, and our manuals will often be faulty. The only responsible way to learn the nuances of the land is to study the soil and vegetation in their natural state and pass this knowledge on to future generations. "[A] small book rich in ideas" (The New York Times Book Review), Nature as Measure collects Jackson's essays from Altars of Unhewn Stone and Becoming Native to This Place, presenting ideas of land conservation and education that are written from the point of view of a man who has practiced what he's preached and proven that it is possible to partially restore much of the land that we've ravaged. Wes Jackson lays the foundation for a new farming economy, grounded in nature's principles and located in dying small towns and rural communities. Exploding the tenets of industrial agriculture, Jackson seeks to integrate food production with nature in a way that sustains both. His longtime friend Wendell Berry provides an informative, contextual Introduction. "For those concerned about what will be left and how many billion will be starving in twenty years, this is a must read." --Register of the Kentucky Historical Society "A good introduction to a thinker whose ideas on agriculture are radical both in their technical approach to food production as well as in terms of the economic, social, and cultural context within which it is practiced." --Review of Radical Political Economics
"As long as humans have been around, we've had to move in order to survive." So arises that most universal and elemental human longing for home, and so begins Greta Gaard's exploration of just precisely what it means to be at home in the world. Gaard journeys through the deserts of southern California, through the High Sierras, the Wind River Mountains, and the Northern Cascades, through the wildlands and waterways of Washington and Minnesota, through snow season, rain season, mud season, and lilac season, yet her essays transcend mere description of natural beauty to investigate the interplay between place and identity. Gaard examines the earliest environments of childhood and the relocations of adulthood, expanding the feminist insight that identity is formed through relationships to include relationships to place. "Home" becomes not a static noun, but an active verb: the process of cultivating the connections with place and people that shape who we become. Striving to create a sense of home, Gaard involves herself socially, culturally, and ecologically within her communities, discovering that as she works to change her environment, her environment changes her. As Gaard investigates environmental concerns such as water quality, oil spills, or logging, she touches on their parallels to community issues such as racism, classism, and sexism, uncovering the dynamic interaction by which "humans, like other life on earth, both shape and are shaped by our environments." While maintaining an understanding of the complex systems and structures that govern communities and environments, Gaard's writing delves deeper to reveal the experiences and realities we displace through euphemisms or stereotypes, presenting issues such as homelessness or hunger with compelling honesty and sensitivity. Gaard's essays form a quest narrative, expressing the process of letting go that is an inherent part of an impermanent life. And when a person is broken, in the aftermath of that letting go, it is a place that holds the pieces together. As long as we are forced to move--by economics, by war, by colonialism--the strategies we possess to make and redefine home are imperative to our survival, and vital in the shaping of our very identities.
Nature on the Doorstep reveals the simple pleasures of paying attention to the natural world in one's own backyard over the course of a year. In weekly letters, Angela Douglas shares the joys and curiosities of a decidedly ordinary patch of green in upstate New York cultivated through the art of "strategic neglect"--sometimes taking a hand to manage wildlife, more often letting nature go its own way.
From the first flowers of spring to cardinals singing in the winter, Douglas shows us the magic of welcoming unexpected plant and animal life into one's backyard. A paean to the richness we find when we stop to look and let be, Nature on the Doorstep celebrates the role humble backyards play both in conservation efforts and in an expanded appreciation of the living world.
In a lifetime of exploration, writing, and passionate political activism, John Muir made himself America's most eloquent spokesman for the mystery and majesty of the wilderness. A crucial figure in the creation of our national parks system and a visionary prophet of environmental awareness, he was also a master of natural description who evoked with unique power and intimacy the untrammeled landscapes of the American West. Nature Writings collects his most significant and best-loved works in a single volume. The Story of My Boyhood and Youth (1913) is Muir's account of growing up by the sea in Scotland, of coming to America with his family at age eleven, and of his early fascination with the natural world. My First Summer in the Sierra (1911) is his famous account of the spiritual awakening he experienced when, 1869, he first encountered the mountains and valleys of central California. The Mountains of California (1894) draws on half a lifetime of exploration of the high Sierra country to celebrate and evoke the region's lakes, forests, flowers, and animals in a masterpiece of observation and poetic description. Also included are the widely popular "Stickeen" (1909), Muir's affectionate story of an adventure with a dog in Alaska, and a rich selection of essays - including "Yosemite Glaciers, " "God's First Temples, " "Snow-Storm on Mount Shasta, " "The American Forests, " and the late appeal "Save the Redwoods" - highlighting various aspects of his career: his exploration of what became Yosemite and Yellowstone national parks and the Grand Canyon, his successful crusades to preserve the wilderness, his early walking tour to Florida, and the Alaska journey of 1879.
Though he didn't realize it at the time, David Lee began this book twenty-five years ago as he was hiking in the mountains outside Kuala Lumpur. Surrounded by the wonders of the jungle, Lee found his attention drawn to one plant in particular, a species of fern whose electric blue leaves shimmered amidst the surrounding green. The evolutionary wonder of the fern's extravagant beauty filled Lee with awe--and set him on a career-long journey to understand everything about plant colors.
Nature's Palette is the fully ripened fruit of that journey--a highly illustrated, immensely entertaining exploration of the science of plant color. Beginning with potent reminders of how deeply interwoven plant colors are with human life and culture--from the shifting hues that told early humans when fruits and vegetables were edible to the indigo dyes that signified royalty for later generations--Lee moves easily through details of pigments, the evolution of color perception, the nature of light, and dozens of other topics. Through a narrative peppered with anecdotes of a life spent pursuing botanical knowledge around the world, he reveals the profound ways that efforts to understand and exploit plant color have influenced every sphere of human life, from organic chemistry to Renaissance painting to the highly lucrative orchid trade. Lavishly illustrated and packed with remarkable details sure to delight gardeners and naturalists alike, Nature's Palette will enchant anyone who's ever wondered about red roses and blue violets--or green thumbs.
Nature's Palette is the fully ripened fruit of that journey--a highly illustrated, immensely entertaining exploration of the science of plant color. Beginning with potent reminders of how deeply interwoven plant colors are with human life and culture--from the shifting hues that told early humans when fruits and vegetables were edible to the indigo dyes that signified royalty for later generations--Lee moves easily through details of pigments, the evolution of color perception, the nature of light, and dozens of other topics. Through a narrative peppered with anecdotes of a life spent pursuing botanical knowledge around the world, he reveals the profound ways that efforts to understand and exploit plant color have influenced every sphere of human life, from organic chemistry to Renaissance painting to the highly lucrative orchid trade. Lavishly illustrated and packed with remarkable details sure to delight gardeners and naturalists alike, Nature's Palette will enchant anyone who's ever wondered about red roses and blue violets--or green thumbs.
Fully updated, covering everything from selecting the right bike to back-country touring.
Toward the end of his life, Loren Eiseley reflected on the mystery of life, throwing light on those dark places traversed by himself and centuries of humankind. The Night Country is a gift of wisdom and beauty from the famed anthropologist. It describes his needy childhood in Nebraska, reveals his increasing sensitivity to the odd and ordinary in nature, and focuses on a career that turns him inward as he reaches outward for answers in old bones.
In 1985 in Columbia, more than 23,000 people died due to the government's failure to take seriously scientists' warnings about an imminent volcanic eruption at Nevado del Ruiz. In 1993, at Volcán Galeras, the death toll was smaller but no less tragic: despite seismic data that foretold possible disaster, an expedition of international scientists proceeded into the volcano. Two hours later, nine people were dead.Expertly detailing the turbulent history of Colombia, Victoria Bruce links together the stories of the heroes, villains, survivors, and victims of these two events. No Apparent Danger is a spellbinding account of clashing cultures and the life-and-death consequences of scientific arrogance.
In this thoughtful, affectionate collection of interviews and letters spanning three decades, beloved poet Gary Snyder talks with South African writer and scholar Julia Martin. Over this period many things changed decisively--globally, locally, and in their personal lives--and these changing conditions provide the back story for a long conversation. It begins in the early 1980s as an intellectual exchange between an earnest graduate student and a generous distinguished writer, and becomes a long-distance friendship and an exploration of spiritual practice. At the project's heart is Snyder's understanding of Buddhism. Again and again, the conversations return to an explication of the teachings. Snyder's characteristic approach is to articulate a direct experience of Buddhist practice rather than any kind of abstract philosophy. In the version he describes here, this practice finds expression not primarily as an Asian import or a monastic ideal, but in the specificities of a householder's life as lived creatively in a particular location at a particular moment in history. This means that whatever "topic" a dialogue explores, there is a sense that all of it is about practice--the spiritual-social practice of a contemporary poet.
"The problem of dominion that has always complicated humanity's relationship with wild places is at the center of Rebecca Lawton's essay collection...her expertise is apparent, as is her enthusiasm."
--THE WALL STREET JOURNAL "Rebecca Lawton's powerful and poetic The Oasis This Time celebrates water as a precious natural resource. The collection is as diverse as it is illuminating. Each essay addresses a unique topic, but all are anchored by keen observations of the environment and musings on alternative solutions to pressing environmental problems."
--FOREWORD REVIEWS Geologist Lawton offers fifteen essays about wildness and water, and how together they form a life-giving oasis needed by all humankind...these essays conjure up a heartfelt missive for all of us to come to terms with the power of water."
--LIBRARY JOURNAL "Part memoir, part conservation treatise, and part history lesson...Lawton's focus is on how human lives are urgently shaped by their connection to water."
--PUBLISHERS WEEKLY "A collection of strong, smart, wise, and deeply knowledgeable essays on water in the West, what it means and has meant to the author throughout her life, and what it means to all of us who depend on nature--the biggest oasis of all--for our lives. I came away from this book better informed, deeply touched, and quietly recommitted to the work of living more gently in our fragile world."
--JULIA WHITTY, author of A Tortoise For The Queen Of Tonga and The Fragile Edge "I opened The Oasis This Time assuming I was going to read about water. But what I read about instead was thirst. In straightforward, sometimes rascally, prose, Lawton digs into all the ways we want to be satiated. Our thirst for adventure, for love, for power and control, for ambitious development with an often warped sense of "progress.' Hers is a wake-up call, shaped by Lawton's deep knowledge and love of place, and mostly her commitment to waterways, streams and creeks and rivers and oceans. We need this book."
--DEBRA GWARTNEY, author of Live Through This and I'm A Stranger Here Myself "In a parched and burning land, humanity's crimes against fresh water stand out with increasing starkness as crimes against ourselves. Through deft, spirited storytelling, Rebecca Lawton faces with compassionate courage the painful truths of our defiled and dwindling waterways; The Oasis This Time bids us to nurture the vital wellsprings we have too long taken for granted."
--SARAH JUNIPER RABKIN, author and illustrator of What I Learned at Bug Camp: Essays on Finding a Home in the World "Rebecca Lawton brings a poet's eye to the landscapes she loves, but she is, at heart, a warrior. With every sentence she fiercely defends what remains, totals her losses, and moves on to the next critical confrontation. In the end The Oasis This Time offers us a surprising amount of hope. Hope that we can survive even the worst of mankind's depredations. Hope that this planet is more resilient than we ever imagined."
--ANDY WEINBERGER, author of The Ugly Man Sits in the Garden: Pieces of a Life "The essays in The Oasis This Time flow like tributaries in a desert river. They meander and eddy and braid. They offer respite and challenge. Rebecca Lawton, as both intimate friend and knowledgeable guide, takes the reader on a dynamic journey from Las Vegas to Alaska, from the Grand Canyon to Ottawa. Her musings on this beloved arid land and its water shimmer with wonder at the life around us&emdash;birds, birds, and more birds!--and within us, and burn with urgency."
--ANA MARIA SPAGNA, author of Uplake: Restless Essays of Coming and Going and The Luckiest Scar on Earth Water, the most critical fluid on the planet, is seen as savior, benefactor, and Holy Grail in these fifteen essays on natural and faux oases. Fluvial geologist and former Colorado River guide Rebecca Lawton follows species both human and wild to their watery roots--in warming deserts, near rising Pacific tides, on endangered, tapped-out rivers, and in growing urban ecosystems.
--THE WALL STREET JOURNAL "Rebecca Lawton's powerful and poetic The Oasis This Time celebrates water as a precious natural resource. The collection is as diverse as it is illuminating. Each essay addresses a unique topic, but all are anchored by keen observations of the environment and musings on alternative solutions to pressing environmental problems."
--FOREWORD REVIEWS Geologist Lawton offers fifteen essays about wildness and water, and how together they form a life-giving oasis needed by all humankind...these essays conjure up a heartfelt missive for all of us to come to terms with the power of water."
--LIBRARY JOURNAL "Part memoir, part conservation treatise, and part history lesson...Lawton's focus is on how human lives are urgently shaped by their connection to water."
--PUBLISHERS WEEKLY "A collection of strong, smart, wise, and deeply knowledgeable essays on water in the West, what it means and has meant to the author throughout her life, and what it means to all of us who depend on nature--the biggest oasis of all--for our lives. I came away from this book better informed, deeply touched, and quietly recommitted to the work of living more gently in our fragile world."
--JULIA WHITTY, author of A Tortoise For The Queen Of Tonga and The Fragile Edge "I opened The Oasis This Time assuming I was going to read about water. But what I read about instead was thirst. In straightforward, sometimes rascally, prose, Lawton digs into all the ways we want to be satiated. Our thirst for adventure, for love, for power and control, for ambitious development with an often warped sense of "progress.' Hers is a wake-up call, shaped by Lawton's deep knowledge and love of place, and mostly her commitment to waterways, streams and creeks and rivers and oceans. We need this book."
--DEBRA GWARTNEY, author of Live Through This and I'm A Stranger Here Myself "In a parched and burning land, humanity's crimes against fresh water stand out with increasing starkness as crimes against ourselves. Through deft, spirited storytelling, Rebecca Lawton faces with compassionate courage the painful truths of our defiled and dwindling waterways; The Oasis This Time bids us to nurture the vital wellsprings we have too long taken for granted."
--SARAH JUNIPER RABKIN, author and illustrator of What I Learned at Bug Camp: Essays on Finding a Home in the World "Rebecca Lawton brings a poet's eye to the landscapes she loves, but she is, at heart, a warrior. With every sentence she fiercely defends what remains, totals her losses, and moves on to the next critical confrontation. In the end The Oasis This Time offers us a surprising amount of hope. Hope that we can survive even the worst of mankind's depredations. Hope that this planet is more resilient than we ever imagined."
--ANDY WEINBERGER, author of The Ugly Man Sits in the Garden: Pieces of a Life "The essays in The Oasis This Time flow like tributaries in a desert river. They meander and eddy and braid. They offer respite and challenge. Rebecca Lawton, as both intimate friend and knowledgeable guide, takes the reader on a dynamic journey from Las Vegas to Alaska, from the Grand Canyon to Ottawa. Her musings on this beloved arid land and its water shimmer with wonder at the life around us&emdash;birds, birds, and more birds!--and within us, and burn with urgency."
--ANA MARIA SPAGNA, author of Uplake: Restless Essays of Coming and Going and The Luckiest Scar on Earth Water, the most critical fluid on the planet, is seen as savior, benefactor, and Holy Grail in these fifteen essays on natural and faux oases. Fluvial geologist and former Colorado River guide Rebecca Lawton follows species both human and wild to their watery roots--in warming deserts, near rising Pacific tides, on endangered, tapped-out rivers, and in growing urban ecosystems.
Lawton thoroughly and eloquently explores human attitudes toward water in the West, from Twentynine Palms, California, to Sitka, Alaska. A lifelong immersion in all things water forms the author's deep thinking about living with this critical compound and sometimes dying in it, on it, with too much of it, or for lack of it. The Oasis This Time, the inaugural Waterston Desert Writing Prize winner, is a call for us to evolve toward a sustainable and even spiritual connection to water.
Thoreau's astute meditations are framed by a biographical essay by acclaimed scholar Robert D. Richardson that delves into the events and relationships influencing Thoreau's philosophy. Sensuous watercolors by Lincoln Perry bring to life the fall colors described so ecstatically by Thoreau, allowing longtime Thoreau fans and leaf-peepers alike to feel as though they are walking among the falling leaves alongside one of our best observers of the natural world.
The Nature Conservancy, long dedicated to the preservation of wild places, asked thirteen writers to visit one of its preserves or write from past outdoor experiences, allowing a place to trigger their imaginations and make a story possible. Several authors were inspired by the Landscapes of their youth (Jill McCorkle's North Carolina woods, or Richard Bausch's Blue Ridge Mountains), white others explored territory unfamiliar to them, such as Eric Lustbader, who trekked to Alaska.The contributors to Off the Beaten Path include many of our finest writers: Julia Alvarez, Rick Bass, Rita Mae Brown, Gretel Ehrlich, Barry Lopez, Howard Norman, and E. Annie Proulx. From the ominous to the humorous, from the tall tale to the meditative monologue, these stories reflect the variety and character of our diminishing wildlands and, in the end, lead us to places in ourselves that only the best fiction can reveal.
The acclaimed author of The Wild Places and Underland examines the subtle ways we are shaped by the landscapes through which we move Chosen by Slate as one of the 50 best nonfiction books of the past 25 years In this exquisitely written book, which folds together natural history, cartography, geology, and literature, Robert Macfarlane sets off to follow the ancient routes that crisscross both the landscape of the British Isles and its waters and territories beyond. The result is an immersive, enthralling exploration of the voices that haunt old paths and the stories our tracks tell. Macfarlane's journeys take him from the chalk downs of England to the bird islands of the Scottish northwest, from Palestine to the sacred landscapes of Spain and the Himalayas. He matches strides with the footprints made by a man five thousand years ago near Liverpool, sails an open boat far out into the Atlantic at night, and commingles with walkers of many kinds, discovering that paths offer a means not just of traversing space but also of feeling, knowing, and thinking.
Outstanding . . . a wide-ranging invitation to think through the moral ramifications of our eating habits. --The New Yorker One of the New York Times Book Review's Ten Best Books of the Year and Winner of the James Beard Award Author of How to Change Your Mind and the #1 New York Times Bestseller In Defense of Food and Food Rules What should we have for dinner? Ten years ago, Michael Pollan confronted us with this seemingly simple question and, with The Omnivore's Dilemma, his brilliant and eye-opening exploration of our food choices, demonstrated that how we answer it today may determine not only our health but our survival as a species. In the years since, Pollan's revolutionary examination has changed the way Americans think about food. Bringing wide attention to the little-known but vitally important dimensions of food and agriculture in America, Pollan launched a national conversation about what we eat and the profound consequences that even the simplest everyday food choices have on both ourselves and the natural world. Ten years later, The Omnivore's Dilemma continues to transform the way Americans think about the politics, perils, and pleasures of eating.
The story of one man's experience of overcoming the hardship of climbing, with very little training or experience, using his Zen training. On Top of Africa offers much practical information for would-be mountain climbers and also offers us all inspired reading as we climb towards the summit of our own mountains, real or imaginary.
Call it "Zen and the Art of Farming" or a "Little Green Book," Masanobu Fukuoka's manifesto about farming, eating, and the limits of human knowledge presents a radical challenge to the global systems we rely on for our food. At the same time, it is a spiritual memoir of a man whose innovative system of cultivating the earth reflects a deep faith in the wholeness and balance of the natural world. As Wendell Berry writes in his preface, the book "is valuable to us because it is at once practical and philosophical. It is an inspiring, necessary book about agriculture because it is not just about agriculture." Trained as a scientist, Fukuoka rejected both modern agribusiness and centuries of agricultural practice, deciding instead that the best forms of cultivation mirror nature's own laws. Over the next three decades he perfected his so-called "do-nothing" technique: commonsense, sustainable practices that all but eliminate the use of pesticides, fertilizer, tillage, and perhaps most significantly, wasteful effort. Whether you're a guerrilla gardener or a kitchen gardener, dedicated to slow food or simply looking to live a healthier life, you will find something here--you may even be moved to start a revolution of your own.
Oracle Bones tells the story of modern-day China and its growing links to the Western world, as
seen through the lives of ordinary people who are connected in one way or another to America. It combines soulful story-telling with a journalist's keen eye for detail resulting in a story that transcends cultural divides and puts a human face on history as it unfolds today.
For every person who has experienced the beauty of the mountains and felt humbled by comparison.
John Muir's Our National Parks--reissued to encourage, and inspire travelers, campers, and contemporary naturalists--is as profound for readers today as it was in 1901.
Take in John Muir's detailed observations of the sights, scents, sounds, and textures of Yosemite, Yellowstone, and forest reservations of the West. Be reminded (as Muir sagely puts), "Wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life."
John Muir's warmth, humor, and passionate advocacy for these public lands is enough to spur any reader on to plan a National Parks adventure of their own.
John Muir was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States, and founder of The Sierra Club. His letters, essays, and books of his adventures in nature have been read by millions.
This best-seller now includes all of the latest information on GPS receivers.
Though at first glance the natural world may appear overwhelming in its diversity and complexity, there are regularities running through it, from the hexagons of a honeycomb to the spirals of a seashell and the branching veins of a leaf. Revealing the order at the foundation of the seemingly chaotic natural world, Patterns in Nature explores not only the math and science but also the beauty and artistry behind nature's awe-inspiring designs. Unlike the patterns we create in technology, architecture, and art, natural patterns are formed spontaneously from the forces that act in the physical world. Very often the same types of pattern and form - spirals, stripes, branches, and fractals, say--recur in places that seem to have nothing in common, as when the markings of a zebra mimic the ripples in windblown sand. That's because, as Patterns in Nature shows, at the most basic level these patterns can often be described using the same mathematical and physical principles: there is a surprising underlying unity in the kaleidoscope of the natural world. Richly illustrated with 250 color photographs and anchored by accessible and insightful chapters by esteemed science writer Philip Ball, Patterns in Nature reveals the organization at work in vast and ancient forests, powerful rivers, massing clouds, and coastlines carved out by the sea. By exploring similarities such as those between a snail shell and the swirling stars of a galaxy, or the branches of a tree and those of a river network, this spectacular visual tour conveys the wonder, beauty, and richness of natural pattern formation.
It was the storm of the century, boasting waves over one hundred feet high -- a tempest created by so rare a combination of factors that meteorologists deemed it 'the perfect storm.' When it struck in October 1991, there was virtually no warning. 'She's comin' on, boys, and she's comin' on strong, ' radioed Captain Billy Tyne of the "Andrea Gail" off the coast of Nova Scotia, and soon afterward the boat and its crew of six disappeared without a trace.
In a narrative taut with the fury of the elements, Sebastian Junger takes us deep into the heart of the storm, depicting with vivid detail the courage, terror, and awe that surface in such a gale. Junger illuminates a world of swordfishermen consumed by the dangerous but lucrative trade of offshore fishing -- 'a young man's game, a single man's game' -- and gives us a glimpse of their lives in the tough fishing port of Gloucester, Massachusetts. He recreates the last moments of the "Andrea Gail" crew and recounts the daring high-seas rescues that made heroes of some and victims of others; and he weaves together the history of the fishing industry, the science of storms, and the candid accounts of the people whose lives the storm touched. "The Perfect Storm" is a real-life thriller that leaves us with the taste of salt air on our tongues and a breathless sense of what it feels like to be caught, helpless, in the grip of a force of nature beyond our understanding or control. We know, on the strength this stark and compelling journey into the dark heart of nature, what it feels like to drown.
"A glorious piece of prose . . . Pollan leads readers on his adventure with humor and grace." --Chicago Tribune A captivating personal inquiry into the art of architecture, the craft of building, and the meaning of modern work "A room of one's own: Is there anybody who hasn't at one time or another wished for such a place, hasn't turned those soft words over until they'd assumed a habitable shape?" When Michael Pollan decided to plant a garden, the result was the acclaimed bestseller Second Nature. In A Place of My Own, he turns his sharp insight to the craft of building, as he recounts the process of designing and constructing a small one-room structure on his rural Connecticut property--a place in which he hoped to read, write, and daydream, built with his own two unhandy hands. Michael Pollan's unmatched ability to draw lines of connection between our everyday experiences--whether eating, gardening, or building--and the natural world has been the basis for the popular success of his many works of nonfiction, including the genre-defining bestsellers The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food. With this updated edition of his earlier book A Place of My Own, readers can revisit the inspired, intelligent, and often hilarious story of Pollan's realization of a room of his own--a small, wooden hut, his shelter for daydreams--built with his admittedly unhandy hands. Inspired by both Thoreau and Mr. Blandings, A Place of My Own not only works to convey the history and meaning of all human building, it also marks the connections between our bodies, our minds, and the natural world.