Science & Nature

Texts in this collection explore topics like climate change, energy, and humanity's place in the environment through a variety of genres, whether the science fiction of Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake or the scientific journalism of Dan Egan's The Death and Life of the Great Lakes.

Desert Solitaire

by Edward Abbey

Publication year 1968

Genre Autobiography / Memoir, Nonfiction

Themes Music, Environment

Tags Science & Nature, Philosophy, Philosophy, Travel Literature, Action & Adventure, Classic Fiction, Biography

Desert Solitaire is Edward Abbey’s 1968 memoir of his six months serving as a park ranger in Utah’s Arches National Park in the late 1950s. Throughout the book, Abbey describes his vivid and moving encounters with nature in her various forms: animals, storms, trees, rock formations, cliffs and mountains. He communicates an uncommon reverence for nature, and an unmistakable disdain for tame, cultured humanity, including the vast majority of the tourists who visit the park... Read Desert Solitaire Summary

Discourse on Method

by René Descartes

Publication year 1637

Genre Book, Nonfiction

Tags Philosophy, French Literature, Education, Education, Science & Nature, World History, Philosophy, Classic Fiction, Religion & Spirituality

French philosopher Rene Descartes’s Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy constitute two halves of a single unified project. The former was first published in 1637, while the latter was first published in 1641. The full title of Discourse on Method is Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting One's Reason and of Seeking Truth in the Sciences. The full title of Mediations on First Philosophy is Meditations on First Philosophy in which the... Read Discourse on Method Summary

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep

by Philip K. Dick

Publication year 1968

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Loneliness, Fear, Death, Marriage, Science & Technology, Trust & Doubt, Religion & Spirituality, Good & Evil, Future

Tags Science Fiction, Science & Nature, Fantasy, Classic Fiction

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is a 1968 novel by American science fiction author Philip K. Dick. Set in a future version of San Francisco in the aftermath of a destructive world war, the novel tells the story of Rick Deckard, a bounty hunter who makes a living by tracking down and killing human-like androids. Dick was already an established science fiction author by 1968; he won the Hugo Award for The Man in... Read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep Summary

Dopamine Nation

by Anna Lembke

Publication year 2021

Genre Book, Nonfiction

Themes Mental Health, Self Discovery, Guilt, Forgiveness, Shame & Pride, Gratitude, Family, Community, Apathy, Nation, Science & Technology, Truth & Lies

Tags Health, Psychology, Science & Nature, Self-Improvement, Addiction & Substance Abuse, Depression & Suicide, Mental Illness, Leadership, Psychology

... Read Dopamine Nation Summary

Dopesick

by Beth Macy

Publication year 2018

Genre Book, Nonfiction

Themes Power & Greed, Economics, Politics & Government, Race

Tags US History, Politics & Government, Science & Nature, Health, Crime & Law, Sociology, World History

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Dragonflight

by Anne McCaffrey

Publication year 1968

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Revenge, Space, Science & Technology

Tags Science Fiction, Fantasy, Action & Adventure, Relationships, Science & Nature, Technology, American Literature, Classic Fiction

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Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic

by Sam Quinones

Publication year 2015

Genre Book, Nonfiction

Tags Politics & Government, Mystery & Crime Fiction, Science & Nature, Sociology, World History, Health

Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsburg Press, 2015) is a nonfiction book by American journalist and writer Sam Quinones. It won the NBCC Award for General Nonfiction and was on Amazon’s list of best books of the year in 2015 as well as Slate’s list of the 50 best books of the past 25 years. In the book Quinones charts the parallel rise of prescription opiates and black tar heroin, and describes... Read Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic Summary

Eating Animals

by Jonathan Safran Foer

Publication year 2009

Genre Book, Nonfiction

Themes Environment

Tags Food, Philosophy, Animals, Health, Science & Nature, Philosophy

Eating Animals is a nonfiction book written by Jonathan Safran Foer and published originally in 2009. Foer is an accomplished novelist, and Eating Animals is his first foray into long-form nonfiction writing. The book fits into a genre of criticism of the food industry, specifically factory farming and animal welfare. Eating Animals is a New York Times bestseller, though it met with mixed reviews regarding both the content and style of Foer’s writing. In 2018... Read Eating Animals Summary

Echo Mountain

by Lauren Wolk

Publication year 2020

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Family, Perseverance, Appearance & Reality, Self Discovery

Tags Historical Fiction, Action & Adventure, Poverty, Animals, Gender & Feminism, Relationships, Science & Nature, Great Depression, Coming of Age, Children`s Literature, World History

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Ecology of a Cracker Childhood

by Janisse Ray

Publication year 1999

Genre Autobiography / Memoir, Nonfiction

Themes Environment

Tags Business & Economics, Science & Nature, Southern Literature, World History, Biography

In the memoir, Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, Janisse Ray describes growing up amidst her family’s junkyard in rural south Georgia. She structures the book in a series of short chapters, each of which focuses on a different aspect of her family life. Between these chapters, Ray also writes descriptions of the longleaf pine forests–an ecosystem that once covered the south Georgia landscape and has been largely destroyed by logging.  Ray is born in Baxley... Read Ecology of a Cracker Childhood Summary

Ecotopia

by Ernest Callenbach

Publication year 1975

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Environment

Tags Science Fiction, Education, Education, Science & Nature, Fantasy, Politics & Government

Ecotopia is a novel set in an alternative historical timeline, one in which Washington, Oregon, and Northern California have seceded from the United States to form a new country: Ecotopia. After independence, the two countries have severed all diplomatic relations and have existed side-by-side with virtually no communication, though there is plenty of mutual distrust, even after twenty years. Enter the novel’s protagonist, William Weston, “top international affairs reporter” for the Times-Post newspaper, who has... Read Ecotopia Summary

Einstein's Dreams

by Alan Lightman

Publication year 1992

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Art, Perseverance, Future, The Past, Appearance & Reality, Space, Fate, Order & Chaos, Religion & Spirituality, Science & Technology, Truth & Lies

Tags Historical Fiction, Philosophy, Science & Nature

Einstein’s Dreams (1993) by Alan Lightman is a best-selling novel that explores the intersection of art and science, and the nature of time. The novel imagines the dreams of a fictionalized version of Albert Einstein to explain various theories about time, leading up to Einstein’s 1905 theory of special relativity, which he formed while working as a patent clerk and starting a family in Berne, Switzerland.Each chapter of the novel features a dream that exemplifies... Read Einstein's Dreams Summary