Here are 79 books that The Death and Life of the Great Lakes fans have personally recommended if you like
The Death and Life of the Great Lakes.
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I grew up in Ohio, just south of the Great Lakes. As a kid, I spent time on the Lakes fishing with my dad. I’ve been fascinated with these freshwater seas and their ecological richness ever since. My love for the Lakes eventually merged with my passion for early American history when I attended graduate school at Notre Dame. There, I began researching how Native peoples understood and utilized the unique geography of the Lakes. That work grew into my first book, Muddy Ground, and I anticipate the rest of my career as a historian will be dedicated to studying the environmental and human history of the Great Lakes region.
Jerry Dennis is a true believer when it comes to the wonderment of the Great Lakes.
As someone who has lived on Lake Michigan’s shore for much of his life, he’s an ideal author for sharing his love of the Lakes, their history, and their ecological wealth.
He travelled through the Lakes on an antiquated sailing ship to the Erie Canal and eventually the Atlantic Ocean as part of this book, and that perspective brings a special clarity to just how wild and unruly this part of the continent remains, even in an age where cities line the shores and technological advances might lead us to take the Lakes, and their valuable freshwater resources, for granted.
Award-winning nature author Jerry Dennis reveals the splendor and beauty of North America’s Great Lakes in this “masterwork”* history and memoir of the essential environmental and economical region shared by the United States and Canada.
No bodies of water compare to the Great Lakes. Superior is the largest lake on earth, and together all five contain a fifth of the world’s supply of standing fresh water. Their ten thousand miles of shoreline border eight states and a Canadian province and are longer than the entire Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the United States. Their surface area of 95,000 square miles…
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
I grew up in Ohio, just south of the Great Lakes. As a kid, I spent time on the Lakes fishing with my dad. I’ve been fascinated with these freshwater seas and their ecological richness ever since. My love for the Lakes eventually merged with my passion for early American history when I attended graduate school at Notre Dame. There, I began researching how Native peoples understood and utilized the unique geography of the Lakes. That work grew into my first book, Muddy Ground, and I anticipate the rest of my career as a historian will be dedicated to studying the environmental and human history of the Great Lakes region.
As you can already tell, I love a good travelogue. And as someone who was drawn to the Great Lakes originally via canoe, I found a fellow-traveler in Margaret Wooster.
Her vantage point comes from the hull of her boat, as she canoes and portages her way around the rivers that drain into Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, and the St. Lawrence River. In canoeing these waterscapes, she recounts the many centuries of history of the area but also shares her perspective as a conservationist when it comes to the challenges of protecting the Lakes and their rivers in our current moment.
Her attention to ecological detail, her rapt descriptions of wetlands riches, and her local storytelling invoke the intwined human and aquatic histories of this region.
I grew up in Ohio, just south of the Great Lakes. As a kid, I spent time on the Lakes fishing with my dad. I’ve been fascinated with these freshwater seas and their ecological richness ever since. My love for the Lakes eventually merged with my passion for early American history when I attended graduate school at Notre Dame. There, I began researching how Native peoples understood and utilized the unique geography of the Lakes. That work grew into my first book, Muddy Ground, and I anticipate the rest of my career as a historian will be dedicated to studying the environmental and human history of the Great Lakes region.
I’m a historian, and I didn’t want to bog down this list with academic history books exclusively. But if I had to recommend one history book, written by a top-notch scholar that offers an accessible and accurate picture of the history of the Great Lakes, it would be Tanner’s Atlas.
This is so much more than just a collection of maps; it is a labor of love by an expert who dedicated her career to understanding the human geography of the Great Lakes region. Readers will find guides to everything from the region’s environmental resources to military clashes between Europeans and Native peoples.
The beautiful maps are further contextualized with text sections laying out the history of the Native peoples of the Lakes from pre-contact through the end of the treaty era in 1871. As someone who believes geography is crucial to understanding history, this is one of my…
The Indian history of the Great Lakes region of the United States and Canada, and particularly of the Ohio Valley, is so complex that it can be properly clarified only with the visual aid of maps. The Atlas of Great Lakes Indian History, in a sequence of thirty-three newly researched maps printed in as many as five colors, graphically displays the movement of Indian communities from 1640 to about 1871, when treaty making between Indian tribes and the United States government came to an end.
History was shaped in this part of North America by intertribal warfare, refugee movements, epidemics…
The Duke's Christmas Redemption
by
Arietta Richmond,
A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.
Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man she…
I grew up in Ohio, just south of the Great Lakes. As a kid, I spent time on the Lakes fishing with my dad. I’ve been fascinated with these freshwater seas and their ecological richness ever since. My love for the Lakes eventually merged with my passion for early American history when I attended graduate school at Notre Dame. There, I began researching how Native peoples understood and utilized the unique geography of the Lakes. That work grew into my first book, Muddy Ground, and I anticipate the rest of my career as a historian will be dedicated to studying the environmental and human history of the Great Lakes region.
I wanted to include a work of fiction on this list and if it was to be fiction about the Great Lakes region it had to be Jim Harrison. If it could only be one Harrison book, then The River Swimmer is the book that best captures the freshwater magic of the Lakes.
This is not like the other works on my list—the title story follows the adventures of a northern Michigan teen named Thad who is an adept swimmer and uses his skill as a river traveler to journey all the way to Chicago. Sprinkled with elements of fantasy, Indigeneity, and bawdiness all together, the work is classic Jim Harrison.
But the reason it belongs on my list is because of the way it captures the magic of these interconnected waterways.
"Among the most indelible American novelists of the last hundred years. . . . [Harrison] remains at the height of his powers." Dwight Garner, The New York Times
"Trenchant and visionary." Ron Carlson, The New York Times Book Review
A New York Times best-seller, enthusiastically received by critics and embraced by readers, The River Swimmer is Jim Harrison at his most memorable: two men, one young and one older, confronting inconvenient loves and the encroachment of urbanity on nature, written with freshness, abundant wit, and profound humanity. In "The Land of Unlikeness," Clive a failed artist, divorced and grappling with…
I’ve been reading and writing environmental history since I was trapped indoors on a rainy afternoon nearly 40 years ago and by chance pulled Alfred Crosby’s The Columbian Exchange off a bookshelf. I read it in one gulp (it’s a short book and the rain lingered) and I’ve never been the same since. I regard the environmental as the most fundamental sort of history, because it places humankind and our history in its full context. I love to learn about how humans and their environments affect one another and to read histories that treat both together—because in reality they have always been, and always will be, intertwined.
This is the story of the world’s biggest freshwater lake from its origin up to today. Most of it focuses on the last two centuries, when Lake Superior changed fast under the impact of deforestation, mining, and industrialization around its shorelines. In the last 50 years or so, environmental regulation in the U.S. and Canada has substantially improved Lake Superior’s water quality, although new threats connected to climate change will require new conservation efforts. Langston lives on the shores of Lake Superior, and writes about it with intimate knowledge and boundless affection.
A compelling exploration of Lake Superior's conservation recovery and what it can teach us in the face of climate change
Lake Superior, the largest lake in the world, has had a remarkable history, including resource extraction and industrial exploitation that caused nearly irreversible degradation. But in the past fifty years it has experienced a remarkable recovery and rebirth. In this important book, leading environmental historian Nancy Langston offers a rich portrait of the lake's environmental and social history, asking what lessons we should take from the conservation recovery as this extraordinary lake faces new environmental threats.
Chris Thomas is an ecologist and evolutionary biologist who is interested in how people are changing the Earth’s biodiversity. He has written over 300 scientific articles on topics as varied as showing that animal species have shifted their distributions closer to the poles as the climate has warmed, how butterflies navigate fragments of remaining habitats as they move through human-altered landscapes, and how invasive plants are increasing rather than reducing biological diversity. Chris is today Director of the Leverhulme Centre for Anthropocene Biodiversity at the University of York in England. His popular book Inheritors of the Earth: How Nature Is Thriving in an Age of Extinction was among The Times, Economist & Guardian Books of the Year for 2017.
This book is full of surprises, taking
on the thorny issue of where different species come from, where people think
they belong, and what people are doing about it. Written in an entertaining
way, Ken Thompson takes on those who hate and try to kill species simply
because they perceive them to be in the wrong place. First, he establishes the
science, pointing out that many species evolved in places that you wouldn't
guess…. Camels did not evolve in western Asia or North Africa originally, but I
won’t spoil the story.
Most species evolved somewhere but today survive
somewhere else. This is obvious to someone like Thompson, whose career
has been based in Sheffield in England, which was at the edge of an ice sheet a
mere 20,000 years ago. Virtually all of the species that live in and
around Sheffield today only colonised the area in the last 10,000…
The ecologist and author of Do We Need Pandas? “presents a stimulating challenge to our perceptions of nature” and non-native species (George Monbiot).
You may be surprised to learn that camels evolved and lived for tens of millions of years in North America—and also that the leek, national symbol of Wales, was a Roman import to Britain, as were chickens, rabbits and pheasants. These classic examples highlight the issues of “native” and “invasive” species. We have all heard the horror stories of invasives wreaking havoc on ecosystems. But do we need to fear invaders?
A fake date, romance, and a conniving co-worker you'd love to shut down. Fun summer reading!
Liza loves helping people and creating designer shoes that feel as good as they look. Financially overextended and recovering from a divorce, her last-ditch opportunity to pitch her firm for investment falls flat. Then…
Menno Schilthuizen is a Dutch evolutionary biologist and ecologist with more than thirty years of research experience under his belt, feeling at home in tropical rainforests as well as in urban greenspaces. He writes in a humorous and accessible manner for the general public about the ways in which the world's ecosystems are shifting and evolving under an increasing human presence. He works and teaches at Naturalis Biodiversity Center in Leiden, the Netherlands.
Fred Pearce, veteran editor of New Scientist, takes on an exploration of what invasive species really are. In doing so, he reveals that many of our engrained opinions regarding these 'exotics' is based on flawed ecology, ecological xenophobia, and ill-founded conservatism. Sure, some invasive species should be fought to save cherished native species from extinction, but Pearce shows us that this should never be the knee-jerk reaction to any immigrant species.
Veteran environmental journalist Fred Pearce used to think of invasive species as evil interlopers spoiling pristine 'natural' ecosystems. Most conservationists would agree. But what if traditional ecology is wrong, and true environmentalists should be applauding the invaders?
In The New Wild, Pearce goes on a journey to rediscover what conservation should really be about. He explores ecosystems from Pacific islands to the Australian outback to the Thames estuary, digs into the questionable costs of invader species, and reveals the outdated intellectual sources of our ideas about the balance of nature.
Keeping out alien species looks increasingly flawed. The new ecologists…
I have enjoyed the beauty of nature since I was a child, and I quickly understood that human life depends on the availability of air, water, and food, all of which are the gifts of nature. Growing up in a period of unbridled and uncontrolled industrialization in West Germany during the 60s and 70s made me understand that we cannot treat nature the way we did, with never-ending pollution of rivers, coastal areas, and air. I decided to try and become a professional environmental manager and study the science-based availability of solutions and apply them so we can learn again how to live in harmony with nature.
Although much of the world's desert ecosystems are poor in plant species and have very low vegetation cover and density, it should not be forgotten that even the flora in desert ecosystems provides a variety of services and benefits to both humans and animals.
Renée Richer and her collaborators have put together a wonderful and highly informative account of the flora of Qatar, which I believe is an inspiration to contemporary conservationists, botanists, and vegetation ecologists. It belongs in the collection of both professional and amateur nature lovers.
With a focus on quality and scientific precision, Hidden Beauty is the definitive guide of plants in Qatar. In addition to the high-quality images throughout, which facilitate the identification of plants, the detailed information has been edited and reviewed by leading global experts in Middle Eastern plants. This process has led, among others, to clarifying and rectifying past misidentifications, and to shedding light to 10 new species of plants newly recorded for Qatar. Targeting both professionals in the field as well as a general audience, the release of this title emphasises the need for environmental assessments at a national and…
I have been passionate about the underlying drivers of environmentally destructive human behavior since I was invited to participate in a study of the impacts of oil development on coastal California when I was in graduate school. At a basic level, I have always been interested in economic development, organizational behavior, and public policy. This project gave me the opportunity to explore the intersection of those interests and expand them into the impacts of humans generally on natural and human-made environments. Southern California oil development and its impacts were not my dissertation topic, but it is one that literally hits close to home, and I have been pursuing it for almost three decades.
I love this book because it ties our insatiable demand for stuff to local, regional, and, indeed, global pollution and environmental destruction that threatens human and animal life.
Each chapter presents an eye-opening case study, my favorite of which explains all the steps that occur to bring bananas from far-off places and into grocery stores through Southern California’s largest ports. In fact, while Oil Beach spells out the impacts of oil refining, shipping, and trucking on humans, I love it, especially because it focuses on birds, whales, and other non-humans. The sad irony of oil-coated birds being treated at a clinic funded by oil companies will not be lost on the reader.
I also love books that are compelling reads. I read this book from start to finish without putting it down.
Can the stories of bananas, whales, sea birds, and otters teach us to reconsider the seaport as a place of ecological violence, tied to oil, capital, and trade?
San Pedro Bay, which contains the contiguous Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, is a significant site for petroleum shipping and refining as well as one of the largest container shipping ports in the world-some forty percent of containerized imports to the United States pass through this so-called America's Port. It is also ecologically rich. Built atop a land- and waterscape of vital importance to wildlife, the heavily industrialized Los Angeles…
“Rowdy” Randy Cox, a woman staring down the barrel of retirement, is a curmudgeonly blue-collar butch lesbian who has been single for twenty years and is trying to date again.
At the end of a long, exhausting shift, Randy finds her supervisor, Bryant, pinned and near death at the warehouse…
I have been researching and writing about the era of the American Civil War for something over half a century. My passion for the subject remains strong today, having just published my seventh book. Given the seemingly endless amounts of material from soldiers and civilians alike, I have enjoyed deeply researching neglected subjects and writing about them in a way that appeals to both historians and general readers. For me the Civil War never grows stale, there are always little-used sources to research and fresh ideas to consider. The American Civil is omnipresent in my life—not excluding weekends and holidays!
Weather has always been a constant topic of conversation, and this was certainly true for the Civil War generation. But it was also a matter of serious concern as it greatly affected the conduct of military campaigns.
With careful attention to the science of weather and meticulous research, Kenneth Noe has crafted what amounts to a “weather history” of the American Civil War that brings new perspectives to the war’s course and would certainly have resonated with everyone from generals to privates to the folks at home.
Noe’s book makes a striking contribution that assesses the impact of weather along with certain unusual climate conditions on the conduct of the war generally and specifically on strategy and logistics. For students of the Civil War, and with apologies to Bob Dylan, we need Ken Noe to know which way the wind blows.
Traditional histories of the Civil War describe the conflict as a war between North and South. Kenneth W. Noe suggests it should instead be understood as a war between the North, the South, and the weather. In The Howling Storm, Noe retells the history of the conflagration with a focus on the ways in which weather and climate shaped the outcomes of battles and campaigns. He further contends that events such as floods and droughts affecting the Confederate home front constricted soldiers' food supply, lowered morale, and undercut the government's efforts to boost nationalist sentiment. By contrast, the superior equipment…
