Hope Dies Last
Visionary People Across the World, Fighting to Find Us a Future
-
- $21.99
Publisher Description
'One of the most exciting books I've ever read'- Louise Erdrich
In this profoundly human and moving narrative, the bestselling author of The World Without Us returns with a book ten years in the making: a study of the precarious state of our planet and what it means to be a human on the front lines of this existential crisis. His new uplifting book, Hope Dies Last, is a literary evocation of our current predicament and the core optimism of the human species against the worst odds we have ever faced.
To write this book, Weisman has travelled the globe witnessing the devastation of climate change and meeting the people striving to mitigate and undo our past transgressions. From the flooding Marshall Islands to wetlands renewal in Iraq, and from the Netherlands to the Korean DMZ to cities and coastlines around the world, he has witnessed personally the best of humanity battling the heat, the hunger, and the rising tides. He profiles the work of big thinkers—engineers, scientists, economists, and psychiatrists—as they devise innovative and wildly creative responses to an uncertain and frightening future. We are at an unprecedented point in history, as our collective exploits on this planet are leading us to our own undoing, and we could be one of the species marching toward extinction.
A remedy to climate anxiety by one of our most important voices on humans’ relationship with the Earth, Hope Dies Last fills a crucial gap in the global conversation: Now that we have passed the point of no return in our battle against climate change, how do we feel, behave, act, plan, and dream as we approach a future decidedly different from what we had expected?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this upbeat report, journalist Weisman (Countdown) profiles individuals working to make the world a better place, most of whom focus on environmental issues. For instance, Weisman describes the efforts of Marc Collins Chen, French Polynesia's minister of tourism, to cope with rising sea levels by developing "modular floating neighborhoods that could be linked together into villages," and how Spanish chef Ángel León's quest for more sustainable food sources led him to develop tuna-head osso buco, crisped moray eel skin, and other dishes that make use of fish parts that are usually discarded. Weisman displays a novelist's flair for characterization, as when he writes of Molly Jahn, a biologist working to create microbe-based food as a backup for crop failures: "A huge mirthful cackle... unexpectedly bursts from this slender woman with loose blond hair, dark blue eyes aflutter behind big glasses." The vibrant portraits serve as a rousing testimony to human ingenuity and perseverance, perhaps best exemplified by the standout story of civil engineer Azzam Alwash. After unsuccessfully pleading with conservation groups and government agencies to resuscitate marshlands drained by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, Alwash resorted to using shovels and an excavator to break through Hussein's dams and restore that ecosystem. This inspires.
