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Silent Spring

Rachel Carson

By: Fawcett Publications, Inc. Amazon Marketplace: 6 new & used starting at $1.78

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Subjects -> Science -> Biological Sciences -> Biology -> General
Subjects -> Science -> Biological Sciences -> Biology -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 136 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

What about malaria in Africa? 2 out of 5 stars.
4 of 6 people found this review helpful.

While Rachel's theories were ahead of her time 40 years ago, many now believe DDT is not the toxin/poison that her book helped label the chemical as. One thing is for SURE: malaria kills millions, including children, in Africa each and every year. DDT could prevent those deaths at a very affordable cost. Malaria in Africa -- one of those unseen ripples in the pond....

the beginning of environmental science 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 1 people found this review helpful.

An amazing woman and book: the beginning of the us taking responsibility for pollution thanks to this book.

Excellent! 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

The book was delivered in good condition and in a timely fashion. I am very pleased with your services.

Ahead of its time. 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This book is more than I expected it to be. It is way ahead of its time and makes an important contribution to the environmental movement.

Of Silent Springs and Loudly Prophecies 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

With this comedy masterpiece, Rachel Carson launched a thorough and successful assault on pesticides commonly used in agriculture. After nearly 45 years, DDT is no longer used. Every organism on the planet has what was once considered a lethal quantity of it in its cells and the human ones are still alive to whine about the worms in their raspberries.

Should you read this book? Yes. It's a thought-provoking indictment, and, like The Jungle 60 years before it, helped shape the world in which we now live. I only wish that all you young, unshaven tree-huggers would understand that panic-peddling is a business just like everything else. Some want to sell you books, others "organic" fruit and others still want to ride panic where politics failed them like a certain secretary of vice presidency or whatever it was Gore did in the 90s.

Second Nature (Bloomsbury Paperbacks Gardening Classics)

Michael Pollan

List Price: $16.50 By: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Amazon Marketplace: 6 new & used starting at $11.96

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Subjects -> Home & Garden -> Gardening & Horticulture -> General AAS
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Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Social Sciences -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 23 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Lawn Mowing et al 5 out of 5 stars.
6 of 6 people found this review helpful.

Pollans description of what is a green thumb and the sysiphean art of mowing reminded me how therapeutic gardening can be and why it cures depression. Thank you Michael for making me look at my roses in a totally different way. You will love this book if you tend to think in pictures and love the art and hard work of gardening.

Editorial Review:

Eight years ago, Harper's Magazine editor Michael Pollan bought an old Connecticut dairy farm. He planted a garden and attempted to follow Thoreau's example: do not impose your will upon the wilderness, the woodchucks, or the weeds. That ethic did not, of course, work. But neither did pesticides or firebombing the woodchuck burrow. So Michael Pollan began to think about the troubled borders between nature and contemporary life.

The result is a funny, profound, and beautifully written book in the finest tradition of American nature writing. It inspires thoughts on the war of the roses; sex and class conflict in the garden; virtuous composting; the American lawn; seed catalogs, and the politics of planting a tree. A blend of meditation, autobiography, and social history, Second Nature is ultimately a modern Walden: a true classic for our time.

What Matters: The World's Preeminent Photojournalists and Thinkers Depict Essential Issues of Our Time

David Elliot Cohen

Amazon Price: $17.46 List Price: $27.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Sterling Amazon Marketplace: 48 new & used starting at $15.05

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Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Photography -> Photojournalism
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 8 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

For more than a century, photography has revealed truths, exposed lies, advanced the public discourse, and inspired people to demand change. Socially conscious pioneers with cameras transformed the world—and that legacy lives on in this eye-opening, thought-provoking, and (we hope) action-inducing book. Like Jacob Riis’s How the Other Half Lives, Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, and Jonathan Schell’s The Fate of the Earth before it, we believe that What Matters will fundamentally alter the way we see and understand the human race and our planet.
What Matters asks: What are the essential issues of our time? What are the pictures that will spark public outrage and spur reform? The answer appears in 18 powerful, page-turning stories by the foremost photojournalists of our age, edited by The New York Times best-selling author/editor David Elliot Cohen (A Day in the Life and America 24/7 series), and featuring trenchant commentary from well-recognized experts and thinkers in appropriate fields. Photographer Gary Braasch and climate-change guru Bill McKibben provide “A Global Warming Travelogue” that takes us from ice caves in Antarctica to smoke-spewing coal plants in Beijing. Brent Stirton and Peter A. Glick examine a “Thirsty World,” chronicling the daily search for clean water in non-developed countries. James Nachtwey and bestselling poverty expert Jeffrey D. Sachs look at the causes of, and cures for, global poverty in “The Bottom Billion.” Stephanie Sinclair and Judith Bruce present the preteen brides of Afghanistan, Nepal, and Ethiopia.
Sometimes the juxtaposition of photographs can be startling: “Shop ‘til We Drop,” Lauren Greenfield’s images of upscale consumer culture, starkly contrast with Shehzad Noorani’s “Children of the Black Dust”—child laborers in Bangladesh, their faces blackened with carbon dust from recycled batteries.
The combination of compelling photographs and insightful writing make this a highly relevant, widely discussed book bound to appeal to anyone concerned about the crucial issues shaping our world. What Matters is, in effect, a 336-page illustrated letter to the next American president about the issues that count. It will inspire readers to do their part—however small—to make a difference: to help, the volume includes extensive “What You Can Do” sections with a menu of web links and effective actions readers can take now. This year give What Matters.

The Geography of Nowhere: The Rise and Decline of America's Man-Made Landscape

James Howard Kunstler

Amazon Price: $10.20 List Price: $15.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Free Press Amazon Marketplace: 101 new & used starting at $3.50

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 50 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

The Geography of Nowhere traces America's evolution from a nation of Main Streets and coherent communities to a land where every place is like no place in particular, where the cities are dead zones and the countryside is a wasteland of cartoon architecture and parking lots.

In elegant and often hilarious prose, Kunstler depicts our nation's evolution from the Pilgrim settlements to the modern auto suburb in all its ghastliness. The Geography of Nowhere tallies up the huge economic, social, and spiritual costs that America is paying for its car-crazed lifestyle. It is also a wake-up call for citizens to reinvent the places where we live and work, to build communities that are once again worthy of our affection. Kunstler proposes that by reviving civic art and civic life, we will rediscover public virtue and a new vision of the common good. "The future will require us to build better places," Kunstler says, "or the future will belong to other people in other societies."

Environment

Charlene Waggoner, Raven

List Price: $38.50 By: Saunders College Publishing Amazon Marketplace: 14 new & used starting at $0.43

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Subjects -> Business & Investing -> Popular Economics -> General
Subjects -> Business & Investing -> Popular Economics -> General AAS
Subjects -> Outdoors & Nature -> Conservation -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Excellent Book for Introduction to Environmental Science 4 out of 5 stars.
7 of 7 people found this review helpful.

I was asked to evaluate ths for the textbook selection committee at a local high school for possible use as the text book for an environmental science class next year. Since my degree is in Environmental Science, and I have done a lot of work with environmental education, I have read a large number of environmental science books and have seen the good, bad and worst of books on the market.

At first I just planned to skim the book, but after reading a few pages I decided to look at the book more closely, and I was impressed with what I saw. The book is well written in clear, easy to understand language, using a good amount of well done graphs, charts and photos. The layout, in addition, was good, making the book flow in an orderly manner.

The information in the book was excellent, and covered the entire range, as much as is possible in one book, of environmental science. The biology and chemistry were integrated nicely and flowed smoothly.

I have rated this book as four stars only because I feel the authors didn't cover the section on renewable energy as well as I would have liked. The book tended to move through the subject rather quickly, offering only a limited view of what can be done to eliminate the use of fossil fuels. In all other ways this book was superior to many I have read.

I would highly recommend this for an introduction course in college, and also think it would bean excellent choice for a text at the AP or regular high school level, provided the students had enough science background to be able to understand the science. I even believe that a motivated home schooled student could study from this book and do quite well in the subject. Overall, one of the best introductory text books I've had the pleasure of reading.

Editorial Review:

Covering the enormous environmental challenges facing our world today, this Third Edition helps readers think critically about these challenges and understand the concepts that underlie environmental problems. Rather than telling readers what to think, the book provides the information and tools they need to reach their own conclusions.

When Smoke Ran Like Water: Tales of Environmental Deception and the Battle Against Pollution

Devra Lee Davis

List Price: $26.00 By: Basic Books Amazon Marketplace: 32 new & used starting at $2.00

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 16 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

In When Smoke Ran Like Water, the world-renowned epidemiologist Devra Davis confronts the public triumphs and private failures of her lifelong battle against environmental pollution. By turns impassioned and analytic, she documents the shocking toll of a public-health disaster--300,000 deaths a year in the U.S. and Europe from the effects of pollution--and asks why we remain silent. She shows how environmental toxins contribute to a broad spectrum of human diseases, including breast cancer, cardiovascular disease, asthma, and emphysema--all major killers--and in addition how these toxins affect the health and development of the heart and lungs, and even alter human reproductive capacity.But the battle against pollution is not just scientific. For Davis, it's personal: pollution is what killed many in her family and forced the others, survivors of the 1948 smog emergency in Donora, Pennsylvania, to live out their lives with damaged health. She vividly describes that episode and also makes startling revelations about how the deaths from the London smog of 1952 were falsely attributed to influenza; how the oil companies and auto manufacturers fought for decades to keep lead in gasoline, while knowing it caused brain damage; behind-the-scenes accounts of the battle to recognize breast cancer as a major killer; and many other battles. When Smoke Ran Like Water makes a devastating case that our approaches to public health need to change.

You Are Here: Exposing the Vital Link Between What We Do and What That Does to Our Planet

Thomas M. Kostigen

Amazon Price: $17.13 List Price: $25.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: HarperOne Amazon Marketplace: 65 new & used starting at $12.97

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Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Social Sciences -> Political Science -> Public Policy
Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Urban Planning & Development -> Environmental Planning
Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Urban Planning & Development -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

In this groundbreaking book, the New York Times bestselling coauthor of The Green Book Thomas M. Kostigen reveals the vital missing link in today's environmental crisis: how we as individuals are connected to the most tenuous geography on the planet. Despite the recent prominence of "green" issues in the news, the direct relationship between our actions and the earth is too often ignored. But the seemingly insignificant things we do every day have the power to literally alter the landscape in the ongoing battle to resuscitate the planet.

There are living narratives of climate change that reveal the consequences of our everyday actions. You Are Here allows us to both comprehend and care about what's happening in these encampments of ruin. Kostigen shows us what may well be a glimpse of our future in Linfen City, China, one of the most polluted places on the planet. From a garbage patch twice the size of Texas in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, to the melting arctic ice shelf, to the flood zone that is Mumbai, India, to the dwindling rainforests of the Amazon, You Are Here describes the environmental crisis in a way we can feel, see, and touch. Kostigen presents us with opportunities for change and shows us how to take action on the spot, wherever we are. Combining groundbreaking research and page-turning frontline reporting, Kostigen pulls back the curtain on the most pressing and provocative issues of the day and in so doing we see the earth and our place on it in a brand new light.

The Measure of Our Success: A Letter to My Children and Yours

Marian Wright Edelman

Amazon Price: $8.00 List Price: $10.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Harper Paperbacks Amazon Marketplace: 227 new & used starting at $0.01

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Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Social Sciences -> Sociology -> Marriage & Family

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 11 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A message we need to pass along to the next generation 5 out of 5 stars.
12 of 12 people found this review helpful.

Drawing from inspirational experiences from her own childhood, Dr. Edelman talks to (not at) her own children, urging them, in whatever occupation they may choose, to serve the community at large. This is also a book for adults (parents, educators, and religious and community leaders) to read, to live a life of principles and a desire to somehow make the world a better place - in short, to serve as the strong, positive role model that so many of our children have had to do without.

The book is also an indictment on how American society and political leadership do a great job at paying lip service to the needs of children but fails miserably in their actions. Complaining, however, is not enough; if children are to grow up to be conscientious and caring citizens, adults must set a good example.

It's a small book with a big heart and a great message. I strongly recommend it to anyone who cares about children and social justice in general.

Editorial Review:

The #1 New York Times bestseller is a thinking person's Life's Little Instruction Book, with simple yet inspirational messages about living.

Our Stolen Future: Are We Threatening Our Fertility,Intelligence and Survival? - A Scientific Detective Story

Theo; etc. Colborn

By: Abacus Amazon Marketplace: 5 new & used starting at $46.77

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 34 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Riviting & Deeply Disturbing 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The inside cover of Our Stolen Future says: "...by two leading environmental scientists and an environmental journalist, is the first book to piece together the compelling evidence from wildlife studies, laboratory experiments, and human data and to lay out the emerging scientific case regarding this largely unrecognized threat. Picking up where Silent Spring left off, it reveals the underlying causes of the symptoms that had so alarmed Carson."

In this book, I got a look at the role that certain chemicals that have been put out into the environment since the 1950's might be affecting plants and animals, including human beings, specifically as "endocrine disruptors" and "hormone imposters." I know there has been some review of Our Stolen Future that call into question the validity of the study that the core ideas in this book are built upon...I honestly don't know enough about the subject to make my own decision about that, YET.

What I can say, is based on previous reading on loosely related subjects (The Crazy Makers, Eat Here, The Omnivores Dilemma), is that I believe that this is entirely possible and if so, it is also deeply disturbing. I did enjoy reading it, though it took me six days to work my way through it because it is fact intensive and books of this nature are, for me, harder to absorb in general (compared to fiction). The information contained here is both enlightening and disturbing...ranging from problems like decreased sperm count and motility in males over the last thirty years, to birth defects, sexual abnormalities, reproductive/fertility issues, the increase of certain types of cancer, and even touching on aggression, attention deficit disorders, and similar concerns. I am glad to have read this one and will read more on the subject to gain a great understanding of the issues touched on in Our Stolen Future. I give it 4 out of 5 stars.

Smogtown: The Lung-Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles

Chip Jacobs, William Kelly

Amazon Price: $17.79 List Price: $26.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Overlook Hardcover Amazon Marketplace: 40 new & used starting at $11.95

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Subjects -> History -> Americas -> United States -> State & Local -> California
Subjects -> History -> Americas -> United States -> State & Local -> West
Subjects -> History -> Americas -> United States -> General

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Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

The smog beast wafted into downtown Los Angeles on July 26, 1943. Nobody knew what it was. Secretaries rubbed their eyes. Traffic cops seemed to disappear in the mysterious haze. Were Japanese saboteurs responsible? A reckless factory? The truth was much worse--it came from within, from Southern California's burgeoning car-addicted, suburban lifestyle.

Smogtown is the story of pollution, progress, and how an optimistic people confronted the epic struggle against airborne poisons barraging their hometowns. With wit, verve, and a fresh look at history, California based journalists Chip Jacobs and William J. Kelly highlight the bold personalities involved, the corporate- tainted science, the terrifying health costs, the attempts at cleanup, and how the smog battle helped mold the modern-day culture of Los Angeles. There are scofflaws aplenty and dirty deals, plus murders, suicides, spiritual despair, and an ever-present paranoia about mass disaster.

Brimming with historic photographs, forgotten anecdotes, and new revelations about our environmentally precarious present, Smogtown is a journalistic classic for the modern age.