The Human Age

Starred review from July 14, 2014
Ackerman (One Hundred Names for Love) addresses a currently vogue topic, the Anthropocene—the geologic age humans have shaped by altering the world’s ecosystems—and in doing so raises the bar for her peers. “We’ve subdued 75 percent of the land surface,” Ackerman points out, “preserving some pockets as ‘wilderness,’ denaturing vast tracts for our businesses and homes, and homogenizing a third of the world’s ice-free land through farming.” Yet in the face of massive changes that have “created some planetary chaos that threatens our well-being,” she finds hope. Ackerman views the efforts of the tiny, deluge-prone Indian Ocean nation of the Maldives to be carbon neutral by 2020 as “a model for changes radical enough to help fix the climate.” Her critical eye focuses on changes at the human as well as the global level: “Anthropocene engineering has penetrated the world of medicine and biology, revolutionizing how we view the body.” The greatest strength of her work, though, is the beauty of her language, the power of her metaphors, and the utterly compelling nature of her examples. Whether Ackerman is writing about an iPad-using orangutan or Polynesian snails whose “interiors belong in a church designed by Gaudí,” her penetrating insight is a joy to behold. Agent: Suzanne Gluck, William Morris Endeavor.

September 15, 2014

Ackerman, author of literary discussions of science and nature, including Dawn Light and Natural History of the Senses, has taken on the Anthropocene (Age of Man), the term for the current geologic epoch popularized by Nobel Laureate Paul Crutzen in 2000. Ackerman describes how our world has changed because of our choices and actions and how this, in turn, has changed us, and optimistically asks how we can change our path and our world for the better. Very literate chapters describe a variety of topics, such as living buildings, blurring the indoor and outdoor, apes using computers, world changes in weather, robotics, and DNA. The material includes approachable examples--climate change in the author's own backyard, for example. Ackerman only lightly covers most of the science but she writes so well that the book will spark readers' interest in examining further what humans are doing. Elizabeth Kolbert's recent The Sixth Extinction has more science but Ackerman is a lighter read. VERDICT Patrons interested in environment, climate change, or endangered species will appreciate this title. [See Prepub Alert, 3/17/14.]--Jean E. Crampon, Univ. of Southern California, Los Angeles, Lib.

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from July 1, 2014
Just as there is consensus about the human role in climate change, the perception that our species is now piloting the planet has led scientists to declare a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene or the Human Age. Ackerman (Dawn Light, 2009), an expert and buoyantly imaginative envoy between the scientific realm and readers, takes measure of why we've reached this watershed and what it means. Grandly curious and skillfully observant, Ackerman reports on her world travels to learn about reconciliation ecology, including the restoring of coast-protecting oyster beds, cutting-edge efforts in renewable energy, architecture that functions (and sometimes resembles) growing organisms, and the topsy-turvy reality in which industrial agriculture has wiped out rural biodiversity while wildlife is rapidly adapting to city life. Ackerman also considers the evolutionary impact of digital technologies, the paradigm-shifting potential of 3-D printing, and wonders if we'll survive our own ingenuity when it comes to increasingly human-like robots. She marvels over epigenetics, the study of the genetic impact of environmental and social factors, and new revelations about how we are our microbes. Without denying that the Human Age has triggered global warming and a terrifying mass extinction, Ackerman banks on our ability to address looming crises with creativity and determination in this precisely illuminating, witty, and resplendently expressive guide to the framework for a more positively human and humane future. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Best-selling Ackerman, author of The Zookeeper's Wife and a much loved speaker, will be appearing across the country in person, on a 20-city satellite tour, and in radio and television interviews and online promotions.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

Starred review from June 15, 2014
A shimmering narrative about how the human and natural worlds coexist, coadapt and interactively thrive.Prolific essayist and naturalist Ackerman (One Hundred Names for Love, 2011, etc.) offers absorbing commentary on both the positive and negative effects of human consumption and innovation on the Earth. We are an ever increasing population of "nomads with restless minds," she writes, and her well-researched, substantiated observances take us from the outer reaches of space to view the world's sprawling cities to the Toronto zoo, where the Orangutan Outreach initiative "Apps for Apes" improves the lives and expands the perceptions of primates whose population is declining. Humans have become "powerful agents of planetary change," she writes, creating wildly fluctuating weather patterns and irreversible global warming, evidenced in our backyards and in the stratosphere and reflected in the migratory patterns of the animal world. Thankfully, Ackerman's ecological forecast isn't completely bleak; hope springs from fieldwork with geologists studying the fossilized record of the "Anthropocene" (the age of human-ecological impact), tech scientists creating bioengineered body organs from 3-D prints, and a French botanist whose research demonstrates the ability to "reconcile nature and man to a much greater degree" by rebalancing the delicate ecosystems damaged by invasive species. Ackerman optimistically presents innovations in "climate farming," the exploding popularity of rooftop farming and the urban-landscaped oasis of Manhattan's High Line. She also examines European attempts to harness everything from body heat to wind energy. Ackerman is less certain about the longevity of the animal world or the true charm of the robotic revolution, but whether debating the moral paradoxes of lab chimeras or the mating rituals of fruit flies, she's a consummate professional with immense intelligence and infectious charm.Through compelling and meditative prose, Ackerman delivers top-notch insight on the contemporary human condition.

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