Green Summer Reads
On Earth Day (I know, I know, that was April, but better late than never), The San Francisco Chronicle compiled a list of environmental books to read. A few of the picks were what I’d consider greeny standard reading: Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth.
It also included the new-to-me World Changing: A User’s Guide for the 21st Century, 600 pages of essays and tips compiled by Alex Steffen and companion to the like-named website.The book is now on my summer reading list, along with Elizabeth Kolbert’s Field Notes From a Catastrophe.
There are many more books I’d add to this list – Thoreau’s On Walden Pond among them (I know, I know, but my green-ness came after I’d finished all required reading) – but I realized, as I was writing this, that this could make for some seriously depressing summer days. So the final spot on my list is The Missing Person by Alix Ohlin. I’m a fan of the youthful Ohlin’s short stories, so this book, set in New Mexico among a band of eco-warriors, will hopefully be a delightful and entertaining read, worth hauling through the forests and into the tent with me. Any other books you’d recommend packing?
