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Set in the North Shore suburbs of Chicago, amid traffic, pollution, and ever-increasing neighborhoods of houses and apartments, these meditative personal essays explore the importance of our connection with the natural world, history, and memory. The Suburban Wild follows the seasons from one spring to the next, celebrating the natural miracles we frequently miss and revealing a territory less tamed than we might imagine. These essays offer the sights and sounds found on the outskirts of cities, just perceptible amid the clutter and din of crowded streets and sidewalks. From the constant humming of cicadas on summer evenings and the seasonal migrations of ducks to the myriad hues in a green heron's feathers, Peter Friederici reveals a complex place in which wild geese and morning commuters share the same habitat.
The essays honor our lost creatures and places, emphasizing the importance of history, memory, and consciousness. The author describes the varying shades and textures of a clay bluff near his childhood home, relating the gradual erosion and recession of this Ice Age-old landform. A description of spirogyra algae blooms on Lake Michigan merges with a discussion of the lake's once abundant native mussels and the imported zebra mussels that are threatening their existence. From recorded memories, Friederici re-creates the sight of the now extinct passenger pigeon. Though awareness of the destruction of the landscape and its creatures is never far from the wonders presented here, The Suburban Wild connects the tracks of wildlife and traces of our changing landscape with our own path through the world. The book explores how history—whether natural or cultural, collective or personal—shapes a landscape, and how human memory shapes that history. At heart, it seeks to forge a link between the world outside our windows and the one inside.
| Price | Condition | Delivery | Seller | Action |
| $99.99 | Digital |
| WonderClub |
Gilles Levesque
reviewed The Suburban Wild on November 27, 2012
The Suburban Wild
I AM DYING OF LOLS. This book is so awful it passes back into "good"-- though your mileage may vary, of course. This is the mother of all terrible conspiracy theory books, combining many smaller conspiracies into one enormous Nazi-driven plot, as though all the Nazis of history managed to party down with the evil fictional Nazis that hunted Indiana Jones, Captain America, and the Basterds, and those vampire Nazi legions of Hellsing infamy.
Roswell and UFOs?
Mulder, it was Nazis.
Water fluoridation?
Sorry General Ripper, it wasn't Commies; it was Nazis.
JFK's assassination?
Nazis.
Shoddy public education?
Nazis.
Fat Man and Little Boy and the bombing of Japan?
Nazis.
Planned Parenthood?
Nazis.
Big Pharma?
Nazis.
NASA?
Nazis.
The Cold War?
Nazis.
Al-Qaeda?
Nazis.
9/11?
All the conspiracies are true! Also? Nazis.
The Bush family?
Totally had ties to Nazis...and so did/does Hillary Clinton, Jerry Falwell, and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Etc.
Etc.
Etc.
I SWEAR TO FREAKING JESUS I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP. The author even finds ties between the organic food movement and Paul Wellstone's plane crash and the freaking Nazis. He blamed so much shit on the Nazis I can't even remember it all...but it basically boiled down to everything. Everything is because of/tied to/developed by/funded by the Nazis. My answer for everything from now until I stop finding it hilarious (which will be...um, never) is going to be, "Nazis."
The books swings between points that might be able to be taken seriously-- such as discussing both the Vatican's and various American corporations' investments in Nazi Germany, which is a valid point mentioned in many other, much more serious and well-researched books-- to claiming outrageously wild and just plain kooky things like that the Nazis found King Solomon's treasure, developed antigravity tech in the 1940s, and are currently making tons of money off of the tobacco industry despite the fact that Nazis were (according to the author) very anti-tobacco. You could drive rockets through the logical holes littering this book and it's stupid claims. And I seriously cannot believe that so many Goodreads readers take this shit seriously. My faith in humanity has taken a crippling blow.
Logical? No. Based in reality? Not really.
Impractically awesome and hilarious as a Wile E. Coyote skit? Fuck yeah! Read it for the LULZ, kids.
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