Non-Fiction: The Fate of Nature: Rediscovering Our Ability to Rescue the Earth by Charles Wohlforth

There is something heartbreaking and prescient about The Fate of Nature (Thomas Dunne Books) even though, despite the subtitle, it isn't actually about cleaning up the Earth. Rather award-winning author Charles Wohlforth (The Whale and the Supercomputer) uses his native Alaska as a lens of possibility. Still, while over 100 million gallons of crude has poured into the Gulf of Mexico, doing untold damage to... well... everything, it’s difficult not to take some of Wohlforth’s lovely words to heart:

The ocean is so vast, it’s everything -- the source and sustenance of life, the birthplace of rain and cleanser of air, the plaent’s essential medium, upon which all land is but an island. Yet on and within the ocean every wave is different and every birth is new.

There are times, while reading The Fate of Nature, I just felt like weeping. It’s a beautiful book. A painful reminder. A unforgettable journey: one that ends in hope.

I won’t heal quickly, though. Perhaps none of us will.