A New York Times New & Noteworthy Book
One of the Daily Beast's 5 Essential Books to Read Before the Election
A collection of theĀ New Yorker's Ā groundbreakingĀ reporting from the front lines of climate changeāincluding writing from Bill McKibben, Elizabeth Kolbert, Ian Frazier, Kathryn Schulz, and more
Just one year after climatologist James Hansen first came before a Senate committee and testified that the Earth was now warmer than it had ever been in recorded history, thanks to humankind's heedless consumption of fossil fuels,Ā New YorkerĀ writer Bill McKibben published a deeply reported and considered piece on climate change and what it could mean for the planet.Ā
At the time, the piece was to some speculative to the point of alarmist; read now, McKibben's work is heroically prescient. Since then,Ā the Ā New YorkerĀ has devoted enormous attention to climate change, describing the causes of the crisis, the political and ecological conditions we now find ourselves in, and the scenarios and solutions we face.Ā
The Fragile EarthĀ tells the story of climate changeāits past, present, and futureātaking readers from Greenland to the Great Plains, and into both laboratories and rain forests. It features some of the best writing on global warming from the last three decades, including Bill McKibben's seminal essay "The End of Nature," the first piece to popularize both the science and politics of climate change for a general audience, and the Pulitzer Prizeāwinning work of Elizabeth Kolbert, as well as Kathryn Schulz, Dexter Filkins, Jonathan Franzen, Ian Frazier, Eric Klinenberg, and others. The result, in its range, depth, and passion, promises to bring light, and sometimes heat, to the great emergency of our age.