Rants from the Hill, Michael P. Branch
Rants from the Hill, Michael P. Branch
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Rants from the Hill
On Packrats, Bobcats, Wildfires, Curmudgeons, a Drunken Mary Kay Lady, and Other Encounters with the Wild in the High Desert

Author: Michael P. Branch

Narrator: David Marantz

Unabridged: 6 hr 58 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 06/21/2022

Synopsis

Welcome to the land of wildfire, hypothermia, desiccation, and rattlers.The stark and inhospitable high-elevation landscape of Nevada’s Great Basin Desert may not be an obvious (or easy) place to settle down, but for self-professed desert rat Michael Branch it’s home. Of course, living in such an unforgiving landscape gives one many things to rant about. Fortunately for us, Branch—humorist, environmentalist, and author of Raising Wild—is a prodigious ranter.From bees hiving in the walls of his house to owls trying to eat his daughters’s cat—not to mention his eccentric neighbors—adventure, humor, and irreverence abound on Branch’s small slice of the world, which he lovingly calls Ranting Hill.

About Michael P. Branch

Michael P. Branch is a professor of literature and environment at the University of Nevada, Reno, and the author of Raising Wild. He lives with his wife, Eryn, and daughters, Hannah Virginia and Caroline Emerson, in the western Great Basin Desert.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Jessaka on July 03, 2023

Michael Branch has a good sense of humor, and I found myself laughing through sections of his book, but then when he wasn’t writing about nature and animals, the book would get really boring. Who cares about the cell towers that are made to look like trees from outer space? But his stories are from......more

Goodreads review by Cindy on June 14, 2017

Rants from the Hill is a compilation of essays Mike Branch wrote for “High Country News” and other publications. Overall, the collection is hilarious, thought-provoking, entertaining, and full of incredible details about the high desert in which he and his family live. The subject matter varies grea......more

Goodreads review by Maggie on December 27, 2024

Michael read the Drunken Mary Kay Lady story out loud to a room of (mostly) female librarians a few years back and it was my first exposure to his humor and sarcasm. I'm now three books in and keep recounting his stories to anyone who will listen to be- though I don't nearly do them justice. Can we......more

Goodreads review by Jane on April 19, 2024

Trigger warning: written by a guy who really hates cats and jokes about violently doing away with his child’s pet. I really had to work hard to forgive this guy enough for “Lucy the Desert Cat” to keep going. There is nothing funny or clever about hating cats and commenting about ways to kill one. “N......more

Goodreads review by Glen on July 03, 2017

I won this book in a goodreads drawing. A fun collection of columns written by a guy who lives in the high desert of Northwestern Nevada. One of the most inhospitable places in this country is what called to this guy, so he could get away from it all. Even in this day and age, it's a struggle to surv......more

Quotes

“Lyrical and subversive, the book is a rollicking celebration of living a joyously untamed life. An engagingly quirky collection.” Kirkus Reviews

“There have been dozens of hermit-in-the-woods Walden-like memoirs and essay collections written since Henry David Thoreau’s death, but few capture Thoreau’s raw, stubborn love for the natural world with as much humor and honesty as Michael P. Branch’s Rants From the Hill” Chicago Tribune

“At its best this book lends to Nevada the sort of sacred quality that good stories give to places. Reading it left me caring about a place I did not know and have never seen…This book fits in well with the hyperlocal tradition of nature writing. Branch knows about something beautiful and wants to share it.” Western American Literature

“If Thoreau drank more whiskey and lived in the desert, he’d write like this.” High Country News

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