From Oak Park Public Library

Explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature. All We Can Save, an anthology edited by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Katharine Keeble Wilkinson, is a collection of diverse voices of women asking critical questions and providing insight and solutions. Curated by two climate leaders, this book leads us away from the brink and toward the possibility of a life-giving future.

From Oak Park Public Library:

Explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature in the Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Group, held on Wednesdays in the later half of the month every other month beginning in January 2024.

In Silent Earth: Averting the Insect Apocalypse award-winning entomologist and conservationist Dave Goulson, drawing on thirty years of research, examines the evidence of an alarming drop in insect numbers around the world, which could cause an ecological disaster. The book ends with practical advice and actions to avert the insect apocalypse.

REGISTER HERE

From Oak Park Public Library:

Explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature in the Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Group, held on Wednesdays in the later half of the month every other month beginning in January 2024.

In The Overstory by Richard Powers, an air force loadmaster in the Vietnam War is shot out of the sky, then saved by falling into a banyan. An artist inherits a hundred years of photographic portraits, all of the same doomed American chestnut. A hard-partying undergraduate in the late 1980s electrocutes herself, dies, and is sent back to life by creatures of air and light. A hearing-and speech-impaired scientist discovers that trees are communicating with one another. These four, and five other strangers—each summoned in different ways by trees—are brought together in a last and violent stand to save the continent's few remaining acres of virgin forest.

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Enjoy a shared love of reading and birds as we discuss this book by Priyanka Kumar.

REGISTRATION REQUIRED: Call Sagawau at 630-257-2045

From Oak Park Public Library:

Explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature in the Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Group, held the last Wednesday of the month every other month beginning in January 2024.

Islands of Abandonment: nature rebounding in the post-human landscape by Cal Flyn explores the places where nature is flourishing in our absence. Flyn visits the eeriest and most desolate places on Earth that due to war, disaster, disease, or economic decay, have been abandoned by humans. What she finds every time is an "island" of teeming new life: nature has rushed in to fill the void faster and more thoroughly than even the most hopeful projections of scientists. The book is a tour through these new ecosystems, in all their glory, as sites of unexpected environmental significance, where the natural world has reasserted its wild power and promise.

Register here: https://oakpark.librarycalendar.com/event/earth-lounge-environmental-book-club-islands-abandonment-60941

From Oak Park Public Library:

Explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature in the Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Group, held the last Wednesday of the month every other month beginning in January 2024.

The Nature Fix: why Nature makes us happier, healthier, and more creative by Florence Williams is an investigation into the restorative benefits of nature. The book draws on cutting-edge research and the author's explorations with international nature therapy programs to examine the relationship between nature and human cognition, mood, and creativity.

Register here: https://oakpark.librarycalendar.com/event/earth-lounge-environmental-book-club-islands-abandonment-60941

From Oak Park Public Library:

The Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Series will meet on the last Wednesdays from August through November to explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature. Register for any or all of the discussions in the series:

• August 30: We Are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast by Jonathan Safran Foer

• September 27: New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color edited by Nisi Shawl

• October 25: The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms That Sustain Life by Johan Eklöf

• November 29: How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue

New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color showcases emerging and seasoned writers of many races telling stories filled with shocking delights, powerful visions of the familiar made strange. Between this book's covers burn tales of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and their indefinable overlappings.

Includes stories by Kathleen Alcala, Minsoo Kang, Anil Menon, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Alex Jennings, Alberto Yanez, Steven Barnes, Jaymee Goh, Karin Lowachee, E. Lily Yu, Andrea Hairston, Tobias Buckell, Hiromi Goto, Rebecca Roanhorse, Indrapramit Das, Chinelo Onwualu and Darcie Little Badger.

Register: https://oakpark.librarycalendar.com/event/earth-lounge-environmental-book-discussion-series-how-beautiful-we-were-48567

From Oak Park Public Library:

The Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Series will meet on the last Wednesdays from August through November to explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature. Register for any or all of the discussions in the series:

• August 30: We Are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast by Jonathan Safran Foer

• September 27: New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color edited by Nisi Shawl

• October 25: The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms That Sustain Life by Johan Eklöf

• November 29: How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue

New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color showcases emerging and seasoned writers of many races telling stories filled with shocking delights, powerful visions of the familiar made strange. Between this book's covers burn tales of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and their indefinable overlappings.

Includes stories by Kathleen Alcala, Minsoo Kang, Anil Menon, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Alex Jennings, Alberto Yanez, Steven Barnes, Jaymee Goh, Karin Lowachee, E. Lily Yu, Andrea Hairston, Tobias Buckell, Hiromi Goto, Rebecca Roanhorse, Indrapramit Das, Chinelo Onwualu and Darcie Little Badger.

Register: https://oakpark.librarycalendar.com/event/earth-lounge-environmental-book-discussion-series-darkness-manifesto

From Oak Park Public Library:

The Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Series will meet on the last Wednesdays from August through November to explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature. Register for any or all of the discussions in the series:

• August 30: We Are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast by Jonathan Safran Foer

• September 27: New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color edited by Nisi Shawl

• October 25: The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms That Sustain Life by Johan Eklöf

• November 29: How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue

New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color showcases emerging and seasoned writers of many races telling stories filled with shocking delights, powerful visions of the familiar made strange. Between this book's covers burn tales of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and their indefinable overlappings.

Includes stories by Kathleen Alcala, Minsoo Kang, Anil Menon, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Alex Jennings, Alberto Yanez, Steven Barnes, Jaymee Goh, Karin Lowachee, E. Lily Yu, Andrea Hairston, Tobias Buckell, Hiromi Goto, Rebecca Roanhorse, Indrapramit Das, Chinelo Onwualu and Darcie Little Badger.

Register: https://oakpark.librarycalendar.com/event/earth-lounge-environmental-book-discussion-series-new-suns

From Oak Park Public Library:

The Earth Lounge Environmental Book Discussion Series will meet on the last Wednesdays from August through November to explore the curiosities and complexities of nature, environmentalism, and sustainability through fiction and nonfiction literature. Register for any or all of the discussions in the series:

• August 30: We Are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast by Jonathan Safran Foer

• September 27: New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color edited by Nisi Shawl

• October 25: The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms That Sustain Life by Johan Eklöf

• November 29: How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue

In We Are the Weather, Jonathan Safran Foer explores the central global dilemma of our time in a deeply personal, and urgent new way. The task of saving the planet will involve a great reckoning with ourselves, he posits―with our all-too-human reluctance to sacrifice immediate comfort for the sake of the future. We have, he reveals, turned our planet into a farm for growing animal products, and the consequences are catastrophic. Only collective action will save our home and way of life.

Register: https://oakpark.librarycalendar.com/index.php/event/earth-lounge-environmental-book-discussion-series-we-are-weather

From the Forest Preserves of Cook County:

Join this season’s lively book discussion about “A Siege of Bitterns” by Steve Burrow.

Join in a lively discussion of Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Kimmerer. Sponsored by the Forest Preserves of Cook County.