An encouraging and diligently researched call to action regarding the most pressing issue of our time.
A weather and climate change journalist envisions a 30-year plan for reversing the effects of climate change.
“A new era of urgently paying attention to nature has arrived,” writes Holthaus; in the introductory chapter, “A Living Emergency,” he delivers an alarming global overview of our current climate conditions. Vividly detailing the severity of recent hurricanes, wildfires, droughts, floods, and other natural disasters that have devastated large sections of our planet, he relates how each can be directly attributed to increased carbon emissions and how the levels in 2019 “were the highest in human history.” “We can no longer deny that weather in every corner of the Earth is different now,” writes the author. “That change is because of us. And we have the power to choose a different path.” Despite the substantial obstacles created by our current political landscape, which is driven by the financial interests of major corporations, Holthaus finds hope in the diligent efforts of leading scientists and environmentalists, the new wave of progressively charged politicians and the concept of the Green New Deal, and youth organizations such as the Sunrise Movement. All emphasize the urgency of finding ways to go beyond simply transitioning to electronic cars; we must radically shift from an aggressive, profit-centric growth economy to a “regenerative economy” focused on sustainability. In the second half of the book, Holthaus outlines a detailed plan by decade, leading up through 2050. Writing in the past tense, he somewhat optimistically lays out the results of these measures as having already taken place—e.g., “2020-2030: Catastrophic Success” or “2030-2040: Radical Stewardship.” In the chapter titled “2040-2050: New Technologies and New Spiritualities,” the author concedes that even with emissions possibly reduced to “two-thirds of current levels,” temperatures “will likely continue to rise” and may require the use of controversial methods of geoengineering, which include the concept of “planet-cooling aerosol technology.”
An encouraging and diligently researched call to action regarding the most pressing issue of our time.Pub Date: June 30, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-288316-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: HarperOne
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
A familiar format, but a timely reminder that cities are made up of individuals, each with their own stories.
Portraits in a post-pandemic world.
After the Covid-19 lockdowns left New York City’s streets empty, many claimed that the city was “gone forever.” It was those words that inspired Stanton, whose previous collections include Humans of New York (2013), Humans of New York: Stories (2015), and Humans (2020), to return to the well once more for a new love letter to the city’s humanity and diversity. Beautifully laid out in hardcover with crisp, bright images, each portrait of a New Yorker is accompanied by sparse but potent quotes from Stanton’s interviews with his subjects. Early in the book, the author sequences three portraits—a couple laughing, then looking serious, then the woman with tears in her eyes—as they recount the arc of their relationship, transforming each emotional beat of their story into an affecting visual narrative. In another, an unhoused man sits on the street, his husky eating out of his hand. The caption: “I’m a late bloomer.” Though the pandemic isn’t mentioned often, Stanton focuses much of the book on optimistic stories of the post-pandemic era. Among the most notable profiles is Myles Smutney, founder of the Free Store Project, whose story of reclaiming boarded‑up buildings during the lockdowns speaks to the city’s resilience. In reusing the same formula from his previous books, the author confirms his thesis: New York isn’t going anywhere. As he writes in his lyrical prologue, “Just as one might dive among coral reefs to marvel at nature, one can come to New York City to marvel at humanity.” The book’s optimism paints New York as a city where diverse lives converge in moments of beauty, joy, and collective hope.
A familiar format, but a timely reminder that cities are made up of individuals, each with their own stories.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781250277589
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
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