Happy Earth Day
Even though every day is Earth Day at EcoLit Books, we wish you all a lovely day and hope it includes some quality time outdoors, with animals, and enjoying all our planet has to share.
Anthropocene
Minding Nature: Winter
The winter issue of Minding Nature (published by our contributor The Center for Humans and Nature out now and well worth reading (free download here). This issue features essays about democratic ecological citizenship, reflections on birdsong, sword ferns, and the cultural wisdom of animals, artistic responses to the Anthropocene, and some beautiful poetry scattered throughout.
The best environmental books we’ve read in 2018
This is our third year of recapping the best books we’ve read over the past year. Here are the 2017 and 2016 lists. We’re so glad that the number of both readers and reviewers of EcoLit Books have grown enough to now have an annual tradition of celebrating our favorite books of the year. And …
Call for Short Stories: Our Entangled Future
Here’s an exciting new call for submissions from the UiO (University of Oslo) Department of Sociology and Human Geography: Attention writers and humanities researchers: this is a call for narratives that bring us closer to the potentiality of the present and activate “the politics of the possible” in our changing climate. Twelve stories will be …
Ecovillages Around the World: 20 Regenerative Designs for Sustainable Communities edited by Frederica Miller
As a conservation biologist I see ecovillages as an example for all of us. We need to reduce our impact on the Earth, and these communities are doing that well. This book looked like it would provide good examples to show my students how they could reduce their impact as well. However, I would have …
The Overstory: An arboreal love story (and lament)
When we started EcoLit Books five years ago, this was the type of book I had in mind. A novel that places nature in its proper place in relation to people. That is, above us — in this case, both figuratively and literally. In The Overstory, Richard Powers has crafted an epic novel that stretches hundreds …
Book Review: The Animals’ Agenda by Marc Bekoff & Jessica Pierce
The Animals’ Agenda: Freedom, Compassion, and Coexistence in the Human Age by Marc Bekoff and Jessica Pierce is an important and timely book that examines the human relationship with — or, more accurately, examines the many ways in which humans use — animals and how this relationship needs to evolve. This book asks readers to rethink …
Happy Earth Day
It’s been nearly 40 years since the first Earth Day, and unfortunately we’ve recently taken a lot more steps backward than forward. Still, we humans have taken a lot of great steps forward since the 1970s. There’s a lot to celebrate about our planet, and so many ways to help it survive and thrive. We …
Opportunity for Writers: Art after Nature from The University of Minnesota Press
I’ve long been a fan of Antennae, a literary/artistic journal created and curated by Giovanni Aloi. So I was thrilled to see that the University of Minnesota Press is partnering with Giovanni and Caroline Piccard on a new book series titled Art after Nature. Here’s their vision for the series: Art after Nature maps new aesthetic territories defined …
The best environmental books we’ve read in 2017
It’s that time of year again, a time to reflect on the books that have left their mark on us. Books that will, over time and with luck, leave their mark on society as well. I polled our contributors to see what books they’ll remember best from 2017. And here we have it — a selection …
Submission window is now open for the 4th annual Siskiyou Prize for New Environmental Literature
Now in its fourth year, The Siskiyou Prize for New Environmental Literature is now open for submissions of published and unpublished manuscripts, including novels, memoirs, short story collections, and essay collections.. The 2017 prize will be judged by New York Times bestselling author Jonathan Balcombe. The winner will receive a cash award of $1,000 and a four-week residency …
Cold Mountain Review: Special Issue on Extinction
Literary journal Cold Mountain Review is currently taking submissions for its Fall 2017 special issue devoted to extinction: As species decline globally at an accelerating rate, greater than at any time in the past 65 million years, we invite submissions that give voice to endangered and vanishing creatures, cultures, and tongues; re/imagine and express creaturely …
Our 2017 Siskiyou Prize judge is Jonathan Balcombe
We are thrilled to announce that our 2017 Siskiyou Prize judge is Jonathan Balcombe. Jonathan’s most recent book is the New York Times bestseller What a Fish Knows: The Inner Lives of our Underwater Cousins, an extraordinary journey underwater that reveals the vast capabilities of fishes. He is also the author of the books The …
ASLE announces 2017 book award finalists
The Association for the Study of Literature and Environment has announced the finalists for their bi-annual book awards. The ASLE book awards “in the areas of ecocriticism and environmental creative writing recognize excellence in the field.” Creative Award Finalists The judges were Emily McGiffin, the winner of the ASLE Creative Writing Award in 2015, …
Thinking About Animals in the Age of the Anthropocene
The anthropocene is the proposed geologic term for the period in which humans have made a significant impact on the earth’s geology and ecosystems. It’s not a term without controversy however, which I learned as I read the first essay in Thinking about Animals in the Age of the Anthropocene. Susan Rustick writes: What will my canine companions …
