- Table View
- List View
Unnatural Harvest: How Genetic Engineering is Altering Our Food
by Ingeborg BoyensAdvertisers may want us to believe that our food is produced on picturesque farms, but the cold reality is that the plants and animals we consume may be the result of genetic engineering in the laboratories of multinational corporations.Biotechnology brings with it implications for human and animal health, the threat of environmental damage, a possible redefining of our global food system and a Pandora's box of ethical questions. But the consuming public remains virtually unaware of the genetic alterations of their food and what that may hold in store.Thoroughly researched and accessibly written, Unnatural Harvest holds nothing back in telling us how the food we now serve ourselves and our children may be altered and why we should be very concerned.
Unplugged
by Steve AntonyA delightful picture book about the wonders of all the fun you can have inside AND outside, by the award-winning Steve Antony, author of the bestselling Please Mr Panda.BLIP spends all day plugged into her computer, playing games and having fun. But when there is a POWER CUT, Blip goes down the stairs and out the front door, where she discovers playing games and having fun . . . OUTSIDE. Isn't it wonderful to be UNPLUGGED? By Steve Antony, winner of the Oscar's First Book Prize, nominated for the Kate Greenaway Medal and shortlisted for the Waterstone's Children's Book Prize."[A] gorgeous piece of propaganda for going outside." & "[T]he book is so elegantly illustrated and cleverly conceived."
Unquenchable: America's Water Crisis and What To Do About It
by Robert Jerome GlennonIn the middle of the Mojave Desert, Las Vegas casinos use billions of gallons of water for fountains, pirate lagoons, wave machines, and indoor canals. Meanwhile, the town of Orme, Tennessee, must truck in water from Alabama because it has literally run out. Robert Glennon captures the irony--and tragedy--of America's water crisis in a book that is both frightening and wickedly comical. From manufactured snow for tourists in Atlanta to trillions of gallons of water flushed down the toilet each year, Unquenchable reveals the heady extravagances and everyday inefficiencies that are sucking the nation dry. The looming catastrophe remains hidden as government diverts supplies from one area to another to keep water flowing from the tap. But sooner rather than later, the shell game has to end. And when it does, shortages will threaten not only the environment, but every aspect of American life: we face shuttered power plants and jobless workers, decimated fi sheries and contaminated drinking water. We can't engineer our way out of the problem, either with traditional fixes or zany schemes to tow icebergs from Alaska. In fact, new demands for water, particularly the enormous supply needed for ethanol and energy production, will only worsen the crisis. America must make hard choices--and Glennon's answers are fittingly provocative. He proposes market-based solutions that value water as both a commodity and a fundamental human right. One truth runs throughout Unquenchable: only when we recognize water's worth will we begin to conserve it.
Unravelling the Soil Microbiome: Perspectives For Environmental Sustainability (SpringerBriefs in Environmental Science)
by Dhananjaya Pratap Singh Ratna Prabha Purushothaman Chirakkuzhyil Abhilash Rama Kant Dubey Vishal Tripathi Rajan Chaurasia Ch. Srinivasa Rao Ali El-KeblawyThis book explores the significance of soil microbial diversity to understand its utility in soil functions, ecosystem services, environmental sustainability, and achieving the sustainable development goals. With a focus on agriculture and environment, the book highlights the importance of the microbial world by providing state-of-the-art technologies for examining the structural and functional attributes of soil microbial diversity for applications in healthcare, industrial biotechnology, and bioremediation studies. In seven chapters, the book will act as a primer for students, environmental biotechnologists, microbial ecologists, plant scientists, and agricultural microbiologists. Chapter 1 introduces readers to the soil microbiome, and chapter 2 discusses the below ground microbial world. Chapter 3 addresses various methods for exploring microbial diversity, chapter 4 discusses the genomics methods, chapter 5 provides the metaproteomics and metatranscriptomics approaches and chapter 6 details the bioinformatics tools for soil microbial community analysis, and chapter 7 concludes the text with future perspectives on further soil microbial uses and applications.
Unruly Waters: How Rains, Rivers, Coasts, and Seas Have Shaped Asia's History
by Sunil AmrithFrom a MacArthur "Genius," a bold new perspective on the history of Asia, highlighting the long quest to tame its watersAsia's history has been shaped by her waters. In Unruly Waters, historian Sunil Amrith reimagines Asia's history through the stories of its rains, rivers, coasts, and seas--and of the weather-watchers and engineers, mapmakers and farmers who have sought to control them. Looking out from India, he shows how dreams and fears of water shaped visions of political independence and economic development, provoked efforts to reshape nature through dams and pumps, and unleashed powerful tensions within and between nations.Today, Asian nations are racing to construct hundreds of dams in the Himalayas, with dire environmental impacts; hundreds of millions crowd into coastal cities threatened by cyclones and storm surges. In an age of climate change, Unruly Waters is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand Asia's past and its future.
Unsaturated Soils - Advances in Testing, Modelling and Engineering Applications: Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Unsaturated Soils, 23-25 June 2004, Anacapri, Italy
by A. Tarantino C. MancusoThis volume contains the Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Unsaturated Soils, which was held in Anacapri, Italy, from 23 to 25 June 2004. This meeting was organized by the Department of Geotechnical Engineering of the University of Naples Federico II and the Department of Mechanical and Structural Engineering of the University of
Unseen Beings: How We Forgot the World Is More Than Human
by Erik Jampa Andersson'Unseen Beings is a magnificent, passionate, brilliantly written manifesto for our urgent reimagining of our relationship with every aspect of the creation… indispensable reading for anyone who longs for a just and balanced human future. Buy it and give it to everyone you know.' Andrew Harvey, author of The Hope A revolutionary perspective on the climate catastrophe bridging history, philosophy, science, and religion.You&’ve heard the hard-hitting data and you&’ve seen the documentaries. But what will it truly take for humanity to change? We will not tackle the climate catastrophe with data alone – we need new stories and new ways of seeing and thinking.By drawing on traditional eco-philosophies and Buddhist wisdom, Erik Jampa Andersson offers an approach to our environmental emergency that will make us rethink the very nature of our existence on this incredible planet. Looking at the climate catastrophe through the framework of disease, Unseen Beings examines our ecological diagnosis, its historical causes and conditions and, crucially, its much-needed treatment, as well as exploring:how and why we constructed a human-centric worldview amazing recent discoveries around non-human intelligencehow religious traditions have dealt with questions of nature, sentience and ecologycritical connections between human health and environmental healthThis book is a call to action. Climate anxiety has left many of us feeling confused and powerless, but there is another way. If we can recover our natural sense of enchantment and kinship with non-human beings, we may still find a path to build a better future.
Unseen City: The Majesty of Pigeons, the Discreet Charm of Snails & Other Wonders of the Urba n Wilderness
by Nathanael JohnsonIt all started with Nathanael Johnson’s decision to teach his daughter the name of every tree they passed on their walk to day care in San Francisco. This project turned into a quest to discover the secrets of the neighborhood’s flora and fauna, and yielded more than names and trivia: Johnson developed a relationship with his nonhuman neighbors.Johnson argues that learning to see the world afresh, like a child, shifts the way we think about nature: Instead of something distant and abstract, nature becomes real—all at once comical, annoying, and beautiful. This shift can add tremendous value to our lives, and it might just be the first step in saving the world.No matter where we live—city, country, oceanside, or mountains—there are wonders that we walk past every day. Unseen City widens the pinhole of our perspective by allowing us to view the world from the high-altitude eyes of a turkey vulture and the distinctly low-altitude eyes of a snail. The narrative allows us to eavesdrop on the comically frenetic life of a squirrel and peer deep into the past with a ginkgo biloba tree. Each of these organisms has something unique to tell us about our neighborhoods and, chapter by chapter, Unseen City takes us on a journey that is part nature lesson and part love letter to the world’s urban jungles. With the right perspective, a walk to the subway can be every bit as entrancing as a walk through a national park.
Unsettling Canada: A National Wake-Up Call
by Naomi Klein Arthur Manuel Grand Chief Grand Chief DerricksonUnsettling Canada is built on a unique collaboration between two First Nations leaders, Arthur Manuel and Grand Chief Ron Derrickson.Both men have served as chiefs of their bands in the B.C. interior and both have gone on to establish important national and international reputations. But the differences between them are in many ways even more interesting. Arthur Manuel is one of the most forceful advocates for Aboriginal title and rights in Canada and comes from the activist wing of the movement. Grand Chief Ron Derrickson is one of the most successful Indigenous businessmen in the country.Together the Secwepemc activist intellectual and the Syilx (Okanagan) businessman bring a fresh perspective and new ideas to Canada’s most glaring piece of unfinished business: the place of Indigenous peoples within the country’s political and economic space. The story is told through Arthur’s voice but he traces both of their individual struggles against the colonialist and often racist structures that have been erected to keep Indigenous peoples in their place in Canada.In the final chapters and in the Grand Chief’s afterword, they not only set out a plan for a new sustainable indigenous economy, but lay out a roadmap for getting there.
Unsettling Nature: Ecology, Phenomenology, and the Settler Colonial Imagination (Under the Sign of Nature)
by Taylor EgganThe German poet and mystic Novalis once identified philosophy as a form of homesickness. More than two centuries later, as modernity’s displacements continue to intensify, we feel Novalis’s homesickness more than ever. Yet nowhere has a longing for home flourished more than in contemporary environmental thinking, and particularly in eco-phenomenology. If only we can reestablish our sense of material enmeshment in nature, so the logic goes, we might reverse the degradation we humans have wrought—and in saving the earth we can once again dwell in the nearness of our own being. Unsettling Nature opens with a meditation on the trouble with such ecological homecoming narratives, which bear a close resemblance to narratives of settler colonial homemaking. Taylor Eggan demonstrates that the Heideggerian strain of eco-phenomenology—along with its well-trod categories of home, dwelling, and world—produces uncanny effects in settler colonial contexts. He reads instances of nature’s defamiliarization not merely as psychological phenomena but also as symptoms of the repressed consciousness of coloniality. The book at once critiques Heidegger’s phenomenology and brings it forward through chapters on Willa Cather, D. H. Lawrence, Olive Schreiner, Doris Lessing, and J. M. Coetzee. Suggesting that alienation may in fact be "natural" to the human condition and hence something worth embracing instead of repressing, Unsettling Nature concludes with a speculative proposal to transform eco-phenomenology into "exo-phenomenology"—an experiential mode that engages deeply with the alterity of others and with the self as its own Other.
Unsolved Mysteries of the Sea
by Lionel And FanthorpeSeas and oceans cover most of the Earth’s surface, yet we know less about what lies beneath them than we do about stars and planets millions of miles away. The seas are filled with intriguing mysteries: How were they formed? What gave rise to stories of sirens, mermaids, and mermen? Where did the old pirates and buccaneers hide their treasure? The answers to these questions and more can be found in Unsolved Mysteries of the Sea.
Unspeakable Horror: The Deadliest Shark Attacks in Maritime History
by Joseph B. HealyThe story of the USS Indianapolis is well-known. After delivering crucial components of the atomic bomb that would level Hiroshima in 1945, the Indianapolis was sunk by a Japanese submarine in the South China Sea. Of the nearly 1,200 men aboard, 900 survived the torpedoing, spilling into the sea. White tip sharks began attacking the next morning and after four days only 300 sailors were alive to rescue. Less famous are the many stories of ships sinking in shark-infested waters with gruesome results. Such as the Cape San Juan, a US troop transport ship that was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine in the Pacific Ocean near the Fiji Islands; nearly 700 of the survivors were killed by sharks. Or the HMS Birkenhead, which sunk off Danger Point, South Africa, in 1852, resulting in 440 shark-related fatalities. In 1927, the luxury Italian cruise liner Principessa Maldafa sank ninety miles off the coast of Albrohos Island while heading to Porto Seguro, Brazil. Nearly 300 who survived the wreck were killed by sharks. In 1909, the French steamer La Seyne collided with British India Steamship Co. liner Onda near Singapore, twenty-six miles from land. One hundred and one people were eventually killed by sharks. In the water, human intelligence is no match for a shark’s brutal, destructive instincts. Sharks are born to kill and eat: They detect distress, smell blood—and attack. Marine disasters such as those above result in humans becoming prey, floating in inner space as shadowy sharks swim below, ready to attack. Helpless to save yourself—floating and waiting, watching the malevolent creatures circle, knowing what will happen . . . a sudden swirl of water, a cloud of blood, the searing pain . . . until there is no more. This is unspeakable horror
Unstinky
by Andy RashAndy Rash brings the laughs in this humorous story of a stinkbug who can't stink.Bud is a happy stinkbug, except when it comes to stinking contests.He always seems to lose to champions like P. U. Bottoms, Lord Stinkington, and The Fumigator.Every time they make smells like OUTHOUSE, GYM SOCK, and ARMPIT, poor Bud ends up smelling like FLOWERS, or FRESH-BAKED BREAD, or CANDY CANE.Stinking just isn't Bud's THING. But what IS his thing?With an ending as fresh as a daisy, and funnier than any funny smell, Andy Rash puts a hilarious spin on a tale of following your nose to happiness.
Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years
by S. Fred Singer Dennis T. AveryAdmitting the existence of global warming, but denying that there is scientific consensus surrounding its causes and the threat it poses, Singer (George Mason U.) and Avery (of the Hudson Institute) argue that recent warming is part of a natural cycle of warming and chilling connected to changes in the sun and dispute the evidence regarding humanity's role in driving it through the production of carbons. They also suggest that it is likely to be much less of a problem than many have predicted. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
Unstoppable Moses: A Novel
by Tyler James SmithIn this coming-of-age debut, a seventeen-year-old boy has one week in the aftermath of a disastrous prank to prove to the authorities, and to himself, that he’s not a worthless jerk who belongs in jail.Moses and his cousin Charlie were best friends, wisecracking pranksters, unstoppable forces of teenage energy—until the night they became accidental arsonists and set in motion a chain of events that left Moses alone, guilt-stricken, and most likely trapped in his dead-end town. Then Moses gets a lucky break: the chance to volunteer as a camp counselor for week and prove that the incident at the bowling alley should be expunged from his record. And since a criminal record and enrollment at Duke are mutually exclusive, he’s determined to get through his community service and get on with his life. But tragedy seems to follow him wherever he goes, and this time, it might just stop him in his tracks.“Unstoppable Moses is radiant; one of those rare debut novels that shines with humor, love, compassion, and hope, with a cast of unforgettable characters that jump off the pages and into your heart. Tyler James Smith is a masterful storyteller.”—Andrew Smith, Printz Honor and Boston Globe-Horn Book Award-winning author of Grasshopper Jungle“When people say reading makes us more empathetic, they are talking about books like Unstoppable Moses by Tyler James Smith. A lyrical, hilarious, so-real-it-hurts debut that reminds us all just how much we have to lose, and why it’s important to never give up. I’m so happy this book is in the world.”—Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock, Morris Honor-winning author of The Smell of Other People’s Houses
Unstoppable: Harnessing Science to Change the World
by Bill Nye“Climate change is coming. What can we do about it? TV’s ‘Science Guy’ has some answers. . . . An important message delivered in a winning manner.” —Kirkus ReviewsJust as World War II called an earlier generation to greatness, so the climate crisis is calling today’s rising youth to action: to create a better future.In Unstoppable, Bill Nye expands the message for which he is best known and beloved. That message is that with a combination of optimism and scientific curiosity, obstacles become opportunities, and the possibilities of our world become limitless. With a scientist’s thirst for knowledge and an engineer’s vision of what can be, Bill Nye sees today’s environmental issues not as insurmountable problems but as chances for our society to rise to the challenge and create a cleaner, healthier, smarter world. We need not accept that transportation consumes half our energy, and that two-thirds of the energy you put into your car is immediately thrown away out the tailpipe. We need not accept that dangerous emissions are the price we must pay for a vibrant economy and a comfortable life. Above all, we need not accept that we will leave our children a planet that is dirty, overheated, and depleted of resources. As Bill shares his vision, he debunks some of the most persistent myths and misunderstandings about global warming. When you are done reading, you’ll be enlightened and empowered. Chances are, you’ll be smiling, too, ready to join Bill and change the world.
Unsustainable Transport and Transition in China (Routledge Studies in Transport, Environment and Development)
by Becky PY LooThis book discusses various transport sustainability issues from the perspective of developing countries, exploring key issues, problems and potential solutions for improving transport sustainability in China. It first reviews the current transport sustainability baselines in the three key dimensions of environmental, economic and social sustainability, via an international comparison encompassing both developed and developing countries in different world regions. Then, with a time frame up to 2030, the study groups 100 major Chinese cities according to their baseline conditions, projected population and economic growth, and common sustainability challenges in passenger transport. A systematic attempt is made to discuss the characteristics, strengths and weaknesses of various emerging sustainable transport strategies, including the metro systems, bus rapid transit, light rail, bicycles (and e-bicycles), electric vehicles and walking. Based on the different city clusters identified, the study then explores the opportunities and constraints of introducing a range of emerging sustainable transport strategies through both statistical analysis and detailed fieldwork. Future directions and challenges are identified based on official documents, onsite observations and interviews with local people. The study concludes with thoughts on sustainable transport in smart cities, the importance of governance, local participation, internal and external city movements, and towards a holistic sustainable transport plan. Unsustainable Transport and Transition in China will be of great interest to scholars interested in carbon emissions, climate change, environmental policy, planning, road safety, sustainability, transportation and urban studies, and is relevant to China and other developing countries.
Unsustainable World: Are We Losing the Battle to Save Our Planet?
by Peter N. NemetzUsing a cross-disciplinary, science- and economics-based approach, this book provides a sobering and comprehensive assessment of the multifaceted barriers to achieving sustainability at a global level. Organized into three parts, the book defines sustainability in part I and sets the context of the historical and current difficulties facing the world today. In parts II and III, it outlines the sustainability challenges faced in transportation, manufacturing, and agriculture, and then in turn addresses the solutions, conditional solutions, and nonsolutions to these challenges. These include electric and autonomous automobiles, nuclear power, renewable energy, geoengineering, and carbon capture and storage. The author attempts to differentiate among those proposed solutions and discusses which are most promising and which are infeasible, counterproductive, and potentially a waste of time and money. In each of the book’s chapters, the scientific evidence is presented in detail, in keeping with the advice of the young Swedish climate activist, Greta Thunberg, to let the science speak for itself. The author outlines why sustainability is unlikely to be achieved in several key areas of human endeavor and readers are challenged to weigh the scientific evidence for themselves. Using an economic business-based approach, this book introduces students and general readers to the challenges of sustainability and the environmental difficulties facing humanity today.
Unsustainable: Measurement, Reporting, and the Limits of Corporate Sustainability
by Matthew ArcherA behind-the-scenes look at how corporate and financial actors enforce a business-friendly approach to global sustainabilityIn recent years, companies have felt the pressure to be transparent about their environmental impact. Large documents containing summaries of yearly emissions rates, carbon output, and utilized resources are shared on companies’ social media pages, websites, and employee briefings in a bid for public confidence in corporate responsibility.And yet, Matthew Archer argues, these metrics are often just hollow symbols. Unsustainable contends with the world of big banks and multinational corporations, where sustainability begins and ends with measuring and reporting. Drawing on five years of research among sustainability professionals in the US and Europe, Unsustainable shows how this depoliticizing tendency to frame sustainability as a technical issue enhances and obscures corporate power while doing little, if anything, to address the root causes of the climate crisis and issues of social inequality. Through this obsession with metrics and indicators, the adage that you can’t manage what you can’t measure transforms into a belief that once you’ve measured social and environmental impacts, the market will simply manage them for you.The book draws on diverse sources of evidence—ethnographic fieldwork among a wide array of sustainability professionals, interviews with private bankers, and apocalyptic science fiction—and features analyses of name-brand companies including Volkswagen, Unilever, and Nestlé. Making the case for the limits of measuring and reporting, Archer seeks to mobilize alternative approaches. Through an intersectional lens incorporating Black and Indigenous theories of knowledge, power and value, he offers a vision of sustainability that aims to be more effective and more socially and ecologically just.
Unsustainable: The History and Politics of Green Energy
by James T. BennettThis book examines the history, politics, and economics of alternative energy. Since the energy crisis of the 1970s, governments around the world have subsidized and otherwise incentivized alternative forms of energy to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. This search has taken on added urgency in the twenty-first century, as the specter of climate change has engendered ambitious state-level renewable portfolio standards, enhanced federal incentives, and inspired “100% renewable” electrical generation targets in such states as Vermont and Hawaii. To save the planet from destruction, wind, solar, and other renewable energy alternatives must replace fossil fuels. But how did we get here and what is the cost? After an in-depth study of the Carter administration's synthetic fuels program, the focus shifts to the two most prominent, perhaps most promising, and certainly most promoted—and government subsidized—“green” and “renewable” energies today: wind and solar. Because wind has made the most headway and drawn the most controversy, it receives the most attention. Although the primary focus is on the American experience with renewable energy, the policies and politics of renewables in Scotland, Wales, Denmark, Spain, and other European nations are also discussed. Issues considered in the book include the nature and efficacy of renewable subsidies; the employment of federal and state tax codes to encourage renewables; the lobbies and interest groups that campaign for government support of renewables; and the fierce battles over the siting of renewable facilities. Unlike other works on this subject, the book probes in depth the nature of the opposition to wind and solar, both in the matter of siting and in their worthiness as recipients of substantial government assistance.
Unsustainable: The Urgent Need to Transform Society and Reverse Climate Change
by Richard JoyThis book is an urgent call to reimagine our social, political and economic systems so that we might transform to a sustainable society. It considers whether an alternative economic model is possible and examines the factors needed to enable such a transition to occur. The scale and pace of change is unprecedented and the author examines the actions that have to be taken by governments, business and individuals if we are to address the environmental disaster that confronts us. Much needs to change but ultimately, this is a book of hope, believing that evolution to a better, more sustainable society is possible.
Untamed: The Wildest Woman in America and the Fight for Cumberland Island
by Will HarlanCarol Ruckdeschel is the wildest woman in America. She wrestles alligators, eats roadkill, rides horses bareback, and lives in a ramshackle cabin that she built by hand in an island wilderness. A combination of Henry David Thoreau and Jane Goodall, Carol is a self-taught scientist who has become a tireless defender of sea turtles on Cumberland Island, a national park off the coast of Georgia.Cumberland, the country’s largest and most biologically diverse barrier island, is celebrated for its windswept dunes and feral horses. Steel magnate Thomas Carnegie once owned much of the island, and in recent years, Carnegie heirs and the National Park Service have clashed with Carol over the island’s future. What happens when a dirt-poor naturalist with only a high school diploma becomes an outspoken advocate on a celebrated but divisive island? Untamed is the story of an American original standing her ground and fighting for what she believes in, no matter the cost.
Until It Hurts to Stop
by Jennifer HubbardWhen you can't trust anyone, how can you ever feel safe?In seventh grade, Maggie Camden was the class outcast. Every day, the other girls tripped her, pinched her, trapped her in the bathroom, told her she would be better off dead. <P><P>Four years have passed since then, and Maggie's tormentors seem to have moved on. The ringleader of them all, Raleigh Barringer, even moved out of town. But Maggie has never stopped watching for attacks, and every laugh still sounds like it's at her expense. The only time Maggie feels at peace is when she's hiking up in the mountains with her best friend, Nick. Lately, though, there's a new sort of tension between the two of them--a tension both dangerous and delicious. <P>But how can Maggie expect anything more out of Nick when all she's ever been told is that she's ugly, she's pathetic, she's unworthy of love? And how can she ever feel safe, now that Raleigh Barringer is suddenly--terrifyingly--back in town?
Until the Beginning
by Amy PlumAmy Plum, international bestselling author of the Die for Me series, delivers a heart-pounding adventure perfect for fans of Michael Grant, Veronica Rossi, and Alexandra Bracken. Until the Beginning brings this duology to a stunning and captivating conclusion.Juneau has been searching for her people and for answers . . . and she is about to find both in the exhilarating sequel to After the End, which Marie Lu, New York Times bestselling author of the Legend series and The Young Elites, called "Wonderfully riveting."When Juneau's clan disappeared, she lost so much more than her friends and family. She soon discovered everything she thought she knew about her life was a lie. Her people's gifts were actually secret abilities that others wanted, desperately enough to kidnap an entire village. Juneau and her new companion Miles's cross-country journey to find her clan has led them to a game preserve in New Mexico. Now Juneau's people are finally within reach, and she will stop at nothing to save them. But she has a target on her back too, because unbeknownst to her she is the key to unlocking everything. To rescue her people--and herself--Juneau must discover what she, and her abilities, are truly capable of.
Until the Full Moon Has Its Say: Until The Full Moon Has Its Say
by Conrad HilberryThe poems in Until the Full Moon Has Its Say were inspired by the loss of poet Conrad Hilberry's wife of fifty-six years, Marion. While the poems in this volume delve into the initial emptiness and hopelessness of grieving, the poet's connections to the natural world, music, and other people ultimately bring him back into the present while still acknowledging and honoring the past. The work of a skilled poet with a lifetime of experience, this collection displays Hilberry's mastery of form. The book's three sections include a sonnet, five villanelles, and a variety of stanza structures, all written in his signature tone, which is contemplative, tender, and moving. The elegant poems of Until the Full Moon Has Its Say arise from the consideration of ordinary, even humble, subjects--a bowl on a table, a blackout, mosquitoes, garlic mustard, algae on the local pond. Hilberry's relaxed voice is wise and measured even in the depths of grief, as he muses, "How can I draw dead branches / in a poem?" Part of the answer to that question lies in the use of form, which gives shape to experience. In his formal virtuosity, Hilberry even writes a villanelle--a notoriously difficult poetic form--about writing a villanelle. Written by the poet in his eighties, Until the Full Moon Has Its Say is a powerful reflection on mortality and on the art that has been his lifelong practice. All readers of poetry will treasure this powerful volume.