Book picks similar to
From Field & Forest: An artist's year in paint and pen by Anna Koska
nature-writing
creativity-art-reads
letters
contemporary
The Perfect Predator: A Scientist's Race to Save Her Husband from a Deadly Superbug: A Memoir
Steffanie Strathdee - 2019
What at first seemed like a case of food poisoning quickly turned critical, and by the time Tom had been transferred via emergency medevac to the world-class medical center at UC San Diego, where both he and Steffanie worked, blood work revealed why modern medicine was failing: Tom was fighting one of the most dangerous, antibiotic-resistant bacteria in the world.Frantic, Steffanie combed through research old and new and came across phage therapy: the idea that the right virus, aka "the perfect predator," can kill even the most lethal bacteria. Phage treatment had fallen out of favor almost 100 years ago, after antibiotic use went mainstream. Now, with time running out, Steffanie appealed to phage researchers all over the world for help. She found allies at the FDA, researchers from Texas A&M, and a clandestine Navy biomedical center -- and together they resurrected a forgotten cure.
Two Gardeners: Katharine S. White & Elizabeth Lawrence--A Friendship in Letters
Emily Herring Wilson - 2002
White was also a great garden enthusiast. In March 1958 she began publishing her popular column, "Onward and Upward in the Garden." Her first column elicited loads of fan mail, but one letter in particular caught her attention. From Elizabeth Lawrence, a noted southern garden writer, it was filled with suggestions and encouragement. When Katharine wrote back her appreciation, she reported on her Maine garden and discussed the plants and books that interested her. Thus began a correspondence that would last for almost twenty years, until Katharine's death in 1977. Two Gardeners is a collection of these luminous letters, edited and introduced by Emily Herring Wilson. The letters bring to life the unique epistolary friendship between two intelligent women, the "formidable" Mrs. White and the "shy" Miss Lawrence, both avid gardeners and readers, both at a stage of life when to make a new friend was rare indeed: when they first wrote to one another, Katharine was sixty-two, Elizabeth, fifty-four.More than 150 letters went back and forth during the course of their correspondence, though Katharine and Elizabeth would meet face-to-face only once. Whether talking about gardens or books, friends or family, each held a special place in the other's life.Illustrated with photographs of both Katharine White and Elizabeth Lawrence, their families, gardens, and houses, this book is a special treat for gardeners, literature lovers, and anyone who delights in reading about women's friendships.
Around the World in 80 Trees
Jonathan Drori - 2018
From India's sacred banyan tree to the fragrant cedar of Lebanon, they offer us sanctuary and inspiration – not to mention the raw materials for everything from aspirin to maple syrup.In Around the World in 80 Trees, expert Jonathan Drori uses plant science to illuminate how trees play a role in every part of human life, from the romantic to the regrettable. Stops on the trip include the lime trees of Berlin's Unter den Linden boulevard, which intoxicate amorous Germans and hungry bees alike, the swankiest streets in nineteenth-century London, which were paved with Australian eucalyptus wood, and the redwood forests of California, where the secret to the trees' soaring heights can be found in the properties of the tiniest drops of water.Each of these strange and true tales – populated by self-mummifying monks, tree-climbing goats and ever-so-slightly radioactive nuts – is illustrated by Lucille Clerc, taking the reader on a journey that is as informative as it is beautiful.
Leave Only Footprints: My Acadia-to-Zion Journey Through Every National Park
Conor Knighton - 2020
But, after a broken engagement and a broken heart, he desperately needed a change of scenery. The ambitious plan he cooked up went a bit overboard in that department; Knighton set out to visit every single one of America's National Parks, from Acadia to Zion. Leave Only Footprints is the memoir of his year spent traveling across the United States, a journey that yielded his "On the Trail" series, which quickly became one of CBS Sunday Morning's most beloved segments. In this smart, informative, and often hilarious book, he'll share how his journey through these natural wonders, unchanged by man, ended up changing his worldview on everything from God to politics to love and technology. Whether it's waking up early for a naked scrub in an Arkansas bathhouse or staying up late to stargaze along our loneliest highway, Knighton goes behind the scenery to provide an unfiltered look at America. In the tradition of books like A Walk in the Woods or Turn Right at Machu Picchu, this is an irresistible mix of personal narrative and travelogue-some well-placed pop culture references, too-and a must-read for any of the 331 million yearly National Parks visitors.
The Running Sky: A Bird-Watching Life
Tim Dee - 2009
It follows the birds' year from one summer to the next. Dee maps his own observations and encounters over four decades, tracking birds well-known and bizarre, flying free, in the nest, in his hand as he rings them, or dead and stuffed on his mantelpiece.
Rain: Four Walks in English Weather
Melissa Harrison - 2016
Fields, farms, hills and hedgerows appear altered, the wildlife behaves differently, and over time the terrain itself is transformed.In Rain, Melissa Harrison explores our relationship with the weather as she follows the course of four rain showers, in four seasons, across Wicken Fen, Shropshire, the Darent Valley and Dartmoor.Blending these expeditions with reading, research, memory and imagination, she reveals how rain is not just an essential element of the world around us, but a key part of our own identity too.
The Wheeling Year: A Poet's Field Book
Ted Kooser - 2014
Because those wobbly stones are only inches above the quotidian rush, what’s jotted there has an immediacy that is intimate and close to life. Kooser, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a former U.S. poet laureate, has filled scores of workbooks. The Wheeling Year offers a sequence of contemplative prose observations about nature, place, and time arranged according to the calendar year. Written by one of America’s most beloved poets, this book is published in the year in which Kooser turns seventy-five, with sixty years of workbooks stretching behind him.
The Cargo Ship Diaries: 2.5 years, 25 countries, 0 flights
Niall Doherty - 2014
We start off in Japan as he’s about to board the cargo ship, and throughout the book flash back to times spent in Amsterdam, Bucharest, Kathmandu, Bangkok and the likes. “I wish I could have written a book this awesome.” – Jack Kerouac Expect plenty of taboo topics, tales of dating misadventures, and honest takes on places like India and Iran. If you like the Momentos series on Niall’s blog, you’ll absolutely love this book. FAQ’s Q. How long is the book? A. 36,506 words on 133 pages. You can read through the whole thing in about three hours. Q. What route did you take from Ireland to Peru? A. Ireland > England > Netherlands > Germany > Switzerland > Austria > Hungary > Romania > Turkey > Iran > UAE > India > Nepal > India > Thailand > Cambodia > Laos > Vietnam > China > Hong Kong > China > Vietnam > Laos > Thailand > Laos > China > South Korea > Japan > Peru Q. Is there a surprise ending? A. Yes, but I’m going to ruin it for you right now: In the last chapter I reveal that I’ve never actually left Ireland, and have been fooling everyone with my photo and video editing skills for years. Suckers! Q. Did Jack Kerouac really say that about your book? A. Um, no. He died thirteen years before I was born. So I kinda lied. Sorry. I hope we can still be friends. Here’s a real testimonial to make amends… “This shit be tight, yo!” – Marco Polo Q. Is there an audio version of the book? A. Yes. You can buy it via my website: http://ndoherty.com/books/cargo/ Q. Are there cargo ship sound effects to go with the audio version of the book? A. I think you can hear a toilet flush at the end of chapter ten. That’s about as good as it gets. Q. Why don't you fly? Sounds dumb. A. It is pretty stupid, and I don't recommend it, but I explain my motivation in the book.
The Way Through the Woods: Of Mushrooms and Mourning
Long Litt Woon - 2017
Soon after her arrival, she met Eiolf. He became the love of her life. After thirty-two years together, Eiolf's sudden death left Woon struggling to imagine a life without the man who had been soulmate and best friend. Adrift in her grief, Woon signs up for a beginner's course on mushrooming. She finds, to her surprise, that the hunt for mushrooms and mushroom knowledge rekindles her appetite for life, awakens her dulled senses, and provides a source of joy and meaning.The Way Through the Woods tells the story of two parallel journeys: an inner one, through the landscape of mourning, and an outer one, into the fascinating realm of mushrooms--resilient, adaptable, dizzyingly diverse, and essential to nature's cycles of death and rebirth. An anthropologist and certified mushroom expert, Woon brings a fresh eye and boundless curiosity to the natural world and takes readers from primordial Norwegian forests to hidden-in-plain-sight Central Park pathways. She also introduces a lovable and eccentric cast of mushroom obsessives. Her explorations of the connections between humans, nature, grief, and healing are universal.
Crazy Plant Lady
Isabel Serna - 2019
You know you’re a crazy plant lady when watering is a hobby, you can’t resist a cute pot, and just looking at succulents and monsteras makes you smile. This charming celebration of the plant lady lifestyle proves that plant love is the joy that keeps growing. There are sweet puns: Aloe you vera much. Plant lady dreams: thrifting the perfect vintage mister. Relatable mantras: Every day is a good day to go plant shopping. All featuring vibrant art by Isabel Serna throughout—plus, a bonus sheet of plant-themed stickers!
The Word for Woman is Wilderness
Abi Andrews - 2018
She's never really left England, but she has watched Bear Grylls and wonders why it's always men who get to go on all the cool wilderness adventures. So Erin sets off on a voyage into the Alaskan wilderness, a one-woman challenge to the archetype of the rugged male explorer.As Erin's journey takes her through the Arctic Circle, across the entire breadth of the American continent and finally to a lonely cabin in the wilds of Denali, she explores subjects as diverse as the moon landings, the Gaia hypothesis, loneliness, nuclear war, shamanism and the pill.Filled with a sense of wonder for the natural world and a fierce love for preserving it, The Word for Woman is Wilderness is a funny, frank and tender account of a young woman in uncharted territory.
Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law
Mary Roach - 2021
The answers are best found not in jurisprudence but in science: the curious science of human-wildlife conflict, a discipline at the crossroads of human behavior and wildlife biology.Roach tags along with animal-attack forensics investigators, human-elephant conflict specialists, bear managers, and "danger tree" faller blasters. Intrepid as ever, she travels from leopard-terrorized hamlets in the Indian Himalaya to St. Peter’s Square in the early hours before the pope arrives for Easter Mass, when vandal gulls swoop in to destroy the elaborate floral display. She taste-tests rat bait, learns how to install a vulture effigy, and gets mugged by a macaque.Combining little-known forensic science and conservation genetics with a motley cast of laser scarecrows, langur impersonators, and trespassing squirrels, Roach reveals as much about humanity as about nature’s lawbreakers. When it comes to "problem" wildlife, she finds, humans are more often the problem—and the solution. Fascinating, witty, and humane, Fuzz offers hope for compassionate coexistence in our ever-expanding human habitat.
Dances With Trout
John Gierach - 1994
In this new collection of essays on fishing —and hunting—Gierach discusses fishing for trout in Alaska, for salmon in Scotland and for almost anything in Texas. He offers his perceptive observations on the subject of ice-fishing, getting lost, fishing at night, tournaments and the fine art of tying flies. Gierach also shares his hunting technique, which involves reading a good book and looking up occasionally to see if any deer have wandered by. Always entertaining, often irreverent and illuminating, Gierach invites readers into his enviable way of life, and effortlessly sweeps them along. As he writes in Dances with Trout, “Fly-fishing is solitary, contemplative, misanthropic, scientific in some hands, poetic in others, and laced with conflicting aesthetic considerations. It’s not even clear if catching fish is actually the point.”
Cascade Summer: My Adventure on Oregon's Pacific Crest Trail
Bob Welch - 2012
To reconnect with his past. And to better understand the 19th-century Cascade Range advocate John Waldo, the state's answer to California's naturalist John Muir. Despite great expectations, near trails end Welch finds himself facing an unlikely challenge. Laughs. Blisters. And new friends from literally around the world-his PCT adventure offered it all. But he never foresaw the bittersweet ending.