Of Slash Pines and Manatees

“With this volume of witty and perceptive essays, Andrew Furman adds South Florida to the literary map, joining the lineage of place-based American writers ranging from Henry David Thoreau and John Muir to Terry Tempest Williams and Wendell Berry. Even if you have never set foot in what he calls his ‘asphalt-frosted’ home territory, his book will invite you to see your own natural and cultural landscape with deeper appreciation.”—Scott Russell Sanders, author of The Way of Imagination

“Through figures as various and variously lovely as orange blossom, night herons, stingrays, and dulse seaweed, Furman takes us on a deep-dive tour through Floridian—and, by extension, American—history and its changing environment. This book not only makes me want to go to Florida but also to spend every minute there outdoors, hoping to see with vision as fresh and sweet as Furman’s the world he lives in and loves.”—Nicole Walker, author of Sustainability: A Love Story

“A rich gathering of brilliantly conceived and gracefully executed literary forays into the surprising wildness of nearby nature. Furman has deftly braided natural history, playful curiosity, and deep insight into a narrative rope strong enough to pull us back into our home places with sharpened awareness, and with a renewed appreciation for the more-than-human world that always surrounds us.”—Michael P. Branch, author of On the Trail of the Jackalope: How a Legend Captured the World’s Imagination and Helped Us Cure Cancer

“A really good primer on how to live in and be engaged with one’s surroundings as an informed eco-citizen and enthusiastic naturalist.”—Rick Van Noy, author of Borne by the River: Canoeing the Delaware from Headwaters to Home

“An eclectic mix of personal narrative and naturalistic description. . . . Furman weaves his own family dynamics together with bioregionalist observations of local nature in a creative, free-flowing book that is accessible to a range of audiences. . . . He encourages his readers to engage more meaningfully and directly with their local watersheds and ecosystems.”—ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment

“This is a book every historian writing on environmental history should read. . . . Offers us a new view of Florida, with historical actors that do not often make it into contemporary accounts.”—H-Net

“Not only deeply nourishing, but also essential reading in an era defined by rapid cultural and environmental change. These essays . . . are themselves as tangled, diverse, and alive as the subtropical forests and swamps of South Florida—a suburban wildness where boundaries blur and unexpected connections thrive.”—Terrain.org