Frederick Douglass, the abolitionist, activist, author and orator, was also a gardener. In 1949 he published an article about growing pumpkins and in it he wrote: The ground was prepared –seed sown– and the planet cultivated by our own colored hands; and although the soil is American, it took no offense on the account of …
There was a time, many years ago, when I believed that I couldn’t give up eating meat because I needed my protein. I was an athlete after all. I needed lots of protein — even though I had little idea what protein actually was. I only believed that it must have come from animals. I …
Laurie Zaleski’s Funny Farm: My Unexpected Life with 600 Rescue Animals is not only a memoir of a hardscrabble life but a lovely tribute to the woman who taught Laurie all she needed to create and run an animal sanctuary. Laurie’s mother, Annie McNulty, gave her the skills — hard work, determination, and a love …
Tenacious Beasts by Christopher Preston explores a wide range of animal recovery efforts — and challenges humans to think differently about how we view wild animals. Book review by Christopher Lancette.
In Pests: How Humans Create Animal Villains, Bethany Brookshire takes a look at myriad animals whom many humans consider pests, from squirrels to cats to elephants, and offers insights into how we can, and must, view animals differently as we coexist during an era of mass extinction. What constitutes a “pest” depends on the animal, …
When the U.S. Army set out to eliminate Native Americans, they first “eradicated the web of life that sustained them,” most notably by slaughtering all the buffalo that they depended on, then depleting the land itself with herds of imported cattle. “The genocide of the Amerindian peoples was the beginning of the modern world for Europe – bringing vast wealth to those countries.”
Guest book review by Gene Helfman. Put simply, reading An Immense World will change how you perceive the world. It certainly has altered my perception. I have decades of experience conducting research on, and teaching about, animal behavior. I thought I had a fairly sophisticated understanding of the natural world. But organisms and environments I …
While reading The Devil’s Element: Phosphorous and a World Out of Balance by Dan Egan I happened to come across this article in The New York Times about a growing crisis along the Cape driven by antiquated septic systems. According to the article: More waste also means more phosphorus entering the Cape’s freshwater ponds, where …
Never had the proverb You are what you eat came to mind so often as I was reading Frankenstein was a Vegetarian by Michael Owen Jones. The book encompasses a wide-ranging assortment of essays about subjects such as the last meals of death row inmates, the meals politicians choose to be photographed eating, and cultural …
As with so many books about the plight of animals in today’s world, Martha C. Nussbaum’s Justice for Animals: Our Collective Responsibility needs to be read most of all by those who eat animals, visit zoos, buy puppies, and so on — in other words, those who may not realize (or who don’t wish to …
(NYU Press— April 4th, 2023) Reviewed by JoeAnn Hart Q: How do you know when you’re in a room with environmentalists? A: Oh, they’ll let you know. Like feminists in the 70s, environmentalists are often portrayed as being too strident, too serious, and having no sense of humor. In the entertaining and informative Stay Cool: …
Here are a few recent books that came across our desks and inboxes… Afterglow: Climate Fiction for Future AncestorsEdited by Grist Afterglow is a stunning collection of original short stories in which writers from many different backgrounds envision a radically different climate future. Published in collaboration with Grist, a nonprofit media organization dedicated to telling stories …
I’ve long believed that the Dust Bowl years were the result of rampant over-farming and generally awful land management. And while this is true, what I didn’t realize until I had read Sixty Harvests Left was that even back then, when the “dusters” were an ever-present threat, there were those in positions of power who …
Philosopher Albert Camus summed it up best when he wrote: “The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.” The books we’ve highlighted below include a number of writers, including our reviewers, who are trying to do just that. We hope you enjoy the reviews and that you support these amazing writers. …