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Summary
Summary
One of Kirkus Reviews ' 100 Best Nonfiction Books of 2022
A gold Nautilus Book Award winner, Ecology & Environment
From rural Alaska to coastal Florida, a vivid account of Americans working to protect the places they call home in an era of climate crisis
How do we find a sense of home and rootedness in a time of unprecedented upheaval? What happens when the seasons and rhythms in which we have built our lives go off-kilter?
Once a distant forecast, climate change is now reaching into the familiar, threatening our basic safety and forcing us to reexamine who we are and how we live. In At Home on an Unruly Planet , science journalist Madeline Ostrander reflects on this crisis not as an abstract scientific or political problem but as a palpable force that is now affecting all of us at home. She offers vivid accounts of people fighting to protect places they love from increasingly dangerous circumstances. A firefighter works to rebuild her town after catastrophic western wildfires. A Florida preservationist strives to protect one of North America's most historic cities from rising seas. An urban farmer struggles to transform a California city plagued by fossil fuel disasters. An Alaskan community heads for higher ground as its land erodes.
Ostrander pairs deeply reported stories of hard-won optimism with lyrical essays on the strengths we need in an era of crisis. The book is required reading for anyone who wants to make a home in the twenty-first century.
Author Notes
Madeline Ostrander is a science journalist and writer whose work has appeared in the NewYorker.com, The Nation , Sierra magazine, PBS's NOVA Next , Slate , and numerous other outlets. Her reporting on climate change and environmental justice has taken her to locations such as the Alaskan Arctic and the Australian outback. She's received grants, fellowships, and residencies from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Artist Trust, the USC Annenberg Center for Health Journalism, the Fund for Investigative Journalism, the Jack Straw Cultural Center, the Mesa Refuge, Hedgebrook, and Edith Cowan University in Australia. She is the former senior editor of YES! magazine and holds a master's degree in environmental science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She lives in Seattle with her husband.
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
"What happens when the rhythms, the seasons, the known patterns within which we have built our homes, our lives, our towns, our places, go off-kilter," science journalist Ostrander wonders in her somewhat uneven debut. In examining how the concept of "home" is shifting as the planet becomes increasingly inhospitable, she cites data showing that in 2019 alone, 24.9 million people lost their homes to "climate change impacts." She interviews an Annapolis, Md., architect working to protect the city from rising sea levels, an Alaska administrator who is relocating a rural community because of erosion, and an ecopsychologist researching the connection between "people's emotional health and the natural world." Ostrander finds examples from history of Indigenous engineering solutions to address rising sea levels, such as coastal shell mounds, that are far more effective than the "shimmering new real estate developments, glassy luxury condos, palatial beach houses, and boxy McMansions" across the Atlantic Coast. Her writing is strong, but she tends to get sidetracked with undeveloped ideas ("We will need a new set of stories about what it looks like to live on Earth in a manner that doesn't destroy our future"). Still, those willing to sift through the chaff will find fascinating musings on a changing planet. (Aug.)
Kirkus Review
An examination of the meaning of home in the current state of climate change. "Everywhere, the weather, the sky, the water, even the terrain on which we have built our homes is becoming unruly," writes science journalist Ostrander in this disturbing yet beautifully written book. As the Earth continues to warm--a problem caused primarily by the fossil fuel demands of humans--weather extremes such as severe drought, megafires, and catastrophic flooding are becoming commonplace. Near-constant fires in the American West continue to force people from their homes, as do the increasing number of tropical storms and hurricanes in the Gulf and along the Atlantic Coast. For decades, as Ostrander shows throughout, researchers have "called for a reckoning with evidence that had been ignored." As the author points out--along with countless other experts before her--we can no longer ignore the evidence, and "everything that we took for granted is now in question." Focusing on the U.S., Ostrander shares four memorable narratives about specific areas already suffering from the effects of climate change: a small town in Alaska being forced to relocate due to thawing of the land; a community in northern California attempting to recover from repeated refinery pollution; towns in Florida and Maryland facing the dire consequences of rising sea levels; and Pateros, Washington, where residents cleaned up rubble and debris after a fire destroyed the town. Interspersed among these stories are Ostrander's pertinent, engaging essays that speak to the theme of home, including the loss of safety and the homesickness that many will likely face from being uprooted. Speaking to the strength and power of community, the author writes, "to have safe homes in the twenty-first century, we cannot keep acting as if we are isolated individuals." A hopeful, urgent, and universal message about our collective ability to face the climate changes we can no longer ignore. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Library Journal Review
Seattle-based science journalist Ostrander has closely followed several environmental stories over the past few years. She visited communities affected by major wildfires in eastern Washington State, coastal flooding in Florida, melting permafrost in Alaska, and oil refinery pollution in California. She predicts many people will be displaced as the climate crisis intensifies: a global estimate in 2019 was 25 million. Several chapters touch on human evolution and one's feelings of home and care for one's surroundings. While the situations are tragic, the author focuses on the experiences and struggles of a few determined individuals. Their leadership mitigated damage, or aided resilience and recovery. A point made throughout is that humans have to live with nature in its new manifestations. For some, that may mean permanent relocation to safer areas. Decades of global government pledges haven't reduced the rate of climate change. Ostrander believes grassroots concern and action is necessary to counter the overheating of the biosphere. Examples include preservation of the Los Angeles aquifer. VERDICT This compassionate reporting brings the reality of climate change to U.S. Americans.--David R. Conn
Table of Contents
| Prologue | p. 1 |
| Part 1 | |
| 1 The Fire | p. 11 |
| 2 Homesick | p. 38 |
| 3 The Flood | p. 49 |
| 4 The First Home | p. 69 |
| 5 The Thaw | p. 82 |
| 6 The Explosion | p. 109 |
| Part 2 | |
| 7 The Home Fires Burning | p. 141 |
| 8 Finding Home Ground | p. 168 |
| 9 Living with Water | p. 180 |
| 10 A Safe Space | p. 199 |
| 11 To Move Home | p. 212 |
| 12 To Clean House | p. 236 |
| Epilogue | p. 276 |
| Notes | p. 279 |
| Acknowledgments | p. 321 |
| Index | p. 325 |
