Not quite land and not quite water, boglands have long been dismissed as wastelands--too sodden to farm, too perilous to cross, too unruly to be considered beautiful. Come closer, however, and a strange truth emerges: These wild, eerie landscapes stretch our minds, hold the history of humanity, and will shape the future of our planet. In Bogland, ecologist Merritt R. Turetsky invites readers to discover the elusive magic and surprising power of these misunderstood places, where the boundaries blur between life and death, past and present, refuge and peril.
Amid the serious science of Bogland is a story that may lack goblins or pixies, but is full of enchantment and drama ... Occasionally the book itself becomes, well, bogged down in repetition ... Yet is a transporting book and a persuasive call to action.
In Bogland, Merritt Turetsky presents bogs as remote and difficult yet beautiful and full of life. There is no mistaking her passion ... An urgent call to save our remaining boglands ... What keeps the book alive are her accounts of fieldwork: wading among stunning carnivorous plants in a Borneo swamp or realizing with grief that peat samples carefully preserved for her doctorate research have been incinerated in a wildfire.
Bogland is a work of natural history, cultural analysis, and memoir that challenges our dismissal of these damp spots. It’s that rare book that gives roots to my lifelong fascination with a murky realm of salvation and murder.
