Way Out There

From critic William Bridges: “I can hardly think when a book has spoken to me as well, or in as many ways, as Mike Daley’s Way Out There: Lyrical Essays. This was not completely apparent on first reading; too old to have experienced the ’60s, I read those chapters distantly, as another well-written counterculture narrative. But Daley brings an unusual sensibility—that of a poet, teacher, and naturalist, with years of preparation (aborted at the last moment) for the Roman Catholic priesthood. He is a brilliant and quiet observer: read “The Duckabush, the Dosey, and the Hamma Hamma” for an explanation of why national parks won’t save the planet. “Climate & Currency” is as good an essay on economics as I’ve read. Daley’s range is wide, from refugees, to how he became a poet, to his time in a Budapest hospital just after 9/11. This is memoir that glints and deepens, like light and shadow on a stream. In fact a river figures in what is to me the most memorable essay, “For the One Among Us Who Will Be the First to Die.” Into this deceptively simple account of an ice-skating expedition, Daley has woven first love, the natural world, and his decision not to become a priest. It is an incomparable short story. This is a book to read more than once—maybe even more than twice.”