From time to time I'll mention books that are particularly interesting to me, especially those that I am encountering for the first time and are most relevant to the content of this website.
The Australian writer Richard Flanagan's new novel is a beautiful, angry, and thoughtful meditation on the effects of global warming on the earth and its creatures, human desire for control, our virtual lives, and dying. In some ways it is not an easy read, and it's got more than a taste of magical realism (not always my thing), but I found it to be so very powerful and well-done. Other novels of Flanagan's that I'd recommend include Death of a River Guide, Narrow Road to the Deep North, and Gould's Book of Fishes.
Robert Macfarlane's Underland is a brilliant and beautiful exploration of the worlds beneath the surface of the Earth - the nexus of tunnels below Paris, the "wood wide web" woven beneath the Epping forest in London, the "starless rivers" than run through the karst topography of Slovenia and Italy, the Slovenian sinkholes (foiba) used for reprisal killings during and after World War II, Norwegian sea caves that contain prehistoric art, a nuclear waste repository in Finland. A stunning, complex, and thoughtful book, full of adventure, ideas, and wonder - Macfarlane's best to date, and that's saying a lot.
I have been rereading Merrill Gilfillan's Magpie Rising, a beautiful evocation of the High Plains. These essays are best read with a road atlas in hand, on a warm day in spring when there's a gentle wind rustling the leaves and a scent of movment in the air - the kind of day when you just want to pick up and go. Another great book of his, which deals with the same country, is Chokecherry Places. In both, Glifillan gets the ambience and history (both natural and human) of the High Plains just right. I've encountered few authors who are as good at summoning a sense of place as is Gilfillan.
David Quammen's The Reluctant Mr. Darwinis a short, very readable biography that covers the period of Darwin's life from the end of the Beagle's voyage (1836) until his death in 1882. Quammen is an excellent science writer, and his account gave me a good sense of Darwin's personality and how he developed his theories of evolution and natural selection. For anyone desiring a detailed account of Darwin's life I recommend Janet Browne's two-volume study: Charles Darwin: Voyaging, and Charles Darwin: The Power of Place.
Robert Macfarlane's Landmarksis a wonderfully compelling book about the interwoven beauty of language and landscape. Macfarlane's exploration of how words respond to and evoke the natural world reminds us of the importance and power of language - and how important it is to use it accurately and honestly. I have read two of Macfarlane's other books, Mountains of the Mind and The Wild Places, and both are excellent.
David Haskell's The Forest Unseen reminds us of the importance of being still, and paying attention to the world. The Forest Unseen describes Haskell's experiences during a year spent observing one square meter of old-growth Tennessee forest. I used his basic approach in my Field Biology course, and found that some students had trouble focusing on a patch of forest floor for just one hour, while others immersed themselves in the process. The experience made me more worried that we are losing our ability to focus, quietly and patiently, on the details of our surroundings.
This is not my first encounter with Craig Childs' The Secret Knowledge of Water. Instead I am rereading it for the second time, and finding it just as compelling as when I first read it, many years ago. A beautifully evocative book that explores the many forms of desert water (seeps, springs, flash floods, water pockets, thin creeks that wax and wane with the time of day). I will take it with me on my next Grand Canyon hiking trip, and read it beside some lovely little trickle of water as it flows through the Tapeats Sandstone . . .