By Tom Comitta Coffee House Press, 2023 Reviewed by JoeAnn Hart “No words of my own can be added anywhere in the novel,” writes The Nature Book’s author, Tom Comitta, with a nod to the Oulipo group[1] and a whiff of Sol LeWitt[2], as he defines the constraints and rules of this extraordinary novel. Every …
Ashland Creek Press was thrilled to host Reading Animals/Writing Animals, sponsored by the Canada Council for the Arts and the Writers’ Union of Canada, with Siskiyou Prize winner and Among Animals 3 contributor Nadja Lubiw-Hazard — and we’re delighted to present a recording of the event. The live event on Wednesday, May 24, was filled …
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, …
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 …
Boy meets girl. Girl goes veg. Boy goes off the deep end. And so begins this heartfelt, occasionally hilarious and generally brilliant graphic novel about one man’s struggle to resist his girlfriend’s vegetarian (and ultimately vegan) calling. The protagonist, Michael, is an army vet who returns to the US and falls for a girl he …
The international literary journal Asymptote has put out a call for the submissions of “animal-themed fictional and non-fictional writings for our special feature in the issue of April 2023.” You can find the call here: https://www.asymptotejournal.com/submit/
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. …
When I look at visitor stats for the past year, EcoLit Books has seen a steady increase in the number of daily visitors. We now average just over 200 unique visitors per day, with many days surpassing 300 and a few days over 500. For a website devoted to environmental and animal literature, these are …
Coyote America: A Natural and Supernatural History by Dan Flores is excellent reading, especially for those of us who’ve shared our landscapes with these magnificent creatures. Flores’s knowledge of the science and history of the coyote is vast, compiled in a highly accessible narrative that combines research, experience, and interviews to create an inspiring portrait …
Guest book review by Gene Helfman. “. . . are such rare, extraordinary kinships valuable because they remind us of a continuity with living creatures that we easily forget?” Susan Orlean, author of The Orchid Thief (turned into an Oscar-winning movie starring Meryl Streep) and The Library Book (a must read for any bibliophile), titled her latest book On Animals when …
Creativity is something that is easier to identify than to explain. And one person’s definition of creativity may vary from your definition. For proof, you need only enter the modern art wing of a museum to hear “Why is that art?” uttered. But though creativity may be in the eye of the beholder, nobody would …
By Mary Roach W. W. Norton & Co, 2021 Review by JoeAnn Hart “Like a deer in the headlights,” we say about someone who freezes in the face of impending doom. Why is that? Why don’t deer jump out of the way when they see us coming in our speeding metal machines? Mary Roach will …
As a zoology student, Lucy Cooke was taught that the females of the species are exploited, weak, and passive. As a human animal, Cooke begged to differ. In Bitch: On the Female of the Species, she challenges this sexist mythology across species, from birds to primates to whales, showing that females can be just as sexually …
Katherine Applegate, author of the Newbery Medal-winning The One and Only Ivan and the widely hailed The One and Only Bob, has returned with the story of Odder. Like Applegate’s other works, Odder is a fictional book intended to introduce young readers to the world of wildlife conservation, interspecies friendships, and the plight of captive …
Kingfishers are birds more often heard than seen. Walk next to Bear Creek here in the Rogue Valley and you will probably hear them, though seeing them is not so easy. Fortunately, we have a new book about the kingfisher by Marina Richie to shed light on this fascinating bird. Marina takes us along with …