Rising from the Plains, John McPhee
Rising from the Plains, John McPhee
List: $19.99 | Sale: $13.99
Club: $9.99

Rising from the Plains

Author: John McPhee

Narrator: Nelson Runger

Unabridged: 7 hr 28 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 03/11/2008


Synopsis

Annals of the Former World is the result of a 20-year journey. During that time, John McPhee, author of 25 books and noted writer for the New Yorker, crisscrossed the United States, roughly following the 40th parallel. The geological insights and wonderful descriptions McPhee packed into his accounts of these trips earned his remarkable book a Pulitzer Prize.

The third part, Rising from the Plains, takes McPhee to the high country of Utah along the Continental Divide. His guide is David Love, “the grand old man of Rocky Mountain geology.” Helping McPhee see the physical changes that have shaped this region over millions of years, Love also traces his own family’s history in this oil-rich, windswept land.

As McPhee climbs into the granite landscape of the Rockies, Rising from the Plains creates a fascinating picture of the interdependence of geology, commerce, and culture.

About John McPhee

John McPhee was born in Princeton, New Jersey, and was educated at Princeton University and Cambridge University. His writing career began at Time magazine and led to his long association with The New Yorker, where he has been a staff writer since 1965. Also in 1965, he published his first book, A Sense of Where You Are, and in the years since, he has written over thirty books, including Oranges, Coming into the Country, The Control of Nature, The Founding Fish, Uncommon Carriers, and Silk Parachute. Encounters with the Archdruid and The Curve of Binding Energy were nominated for National Book Awards in the category of science. McPhee received the Award in Literature from the Academy of Arts and Letters in 1977. In 1999, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Annals of the Former World. He lives in Princeton, New Jersey.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Clay on January 16, 2009

This book was phenomenal. It is a must read for anyone interested in Rocky Mountain geology, or in getting a glimpse into the American west. This book has been republished in McPhee's larger Annals of a Former World. It is a biography of the famous Wyoming geologist, J. David Love. But it also gives a......more

Goodreads review by David on June 29, 2021

McPhee at his best. The author mixes geology, history and humans into a tightly woven story. Wyoming could not be more alive than in this story about the early 20th century settlers. John Love settled at the epicenter of Wyoming and has two sons and a daughter. His son, David Love, took up geology of......more