Fire Weather

A True Story from a Hotter World

De: John Vaillant

Narrado por: Alan Carlson

A stunning account of a colossal wildfire and a panoramic exploration of the rapidly changing relationship between fire and humankind from the award-winning, best-selling author of The Tiger and The Golden Spruce

“Riveting, spellbinding, astounding on every page…Captures the majesty and horror of one of [our] great disasters.” —David Wallace-Wells, #1 bestselling author of The Uninhabitable Earth

In May 2016, Fort McMurray, the hub of Canada’s oil industry and America’s biggest foreign supplier, was overrun by wildfire. The multi-billion-dollar disaster melted vehicles, turned entire neighborhoods into firebombs, and drove 88,000 people from their homes in a single afternoon. Through the lens of this apocalyptic conflagration—the wildfire equivalent of Hurricane Katrina—John Vaillant warns that this was not a unique event, but a shocking preview of what we must prepare for in a hotter, more flammable world.

For hundreds of millennia, fire has been a partner in our evolution, shaping culture, civilization, and, very likely, our brains. Fire has enabled us to cook our food, defend and heat our homes, and power the machines that drive our titanic economy. Yet this volatile energy source has always threatened to elude our control, and in our new age of intensifying climate change, we are seeing its destructive power unleashed in previously unimaginable ways.

With masterly prose and a cinematic eye, Vaillanttakes us on a riveting journey through the intertwined histories of North America’s oil industry and the birth of climate science, to the unprecedented devastation wrought by modern forest fires, and into lives forever changed by these disasters. John Vaillant’s urgent work is a book for—and from—our new century of fire, which has only just begun.


* This audiobook edition includes a downloadable PDF of maps, images, and charts from the book.

Fantastic

This book went far beyond my expectations, and the narrator was excellent. I have read many books about wildfire, from Norman Maclean’s Young Men and Fire to Stephen Pyne’s Pyrocene, and in my opinion this ranks among the best. The author wonderfully combined people’s experiences with history and science (and some history of science) to produce a complete, rounded account of the fire. Thank you for this excellent book!

Excellent story and a huge warning for our earth

Found this book very interesting. Enjoyed the history around fossil fuels and the danger they bring to our earth and mankind. Also the fire was unimaginable. I cannot fathom living through that experience.

Macho yet smart!

I appreciated the gripping story around the Canadian fires and later the context. Should be required reading for high school seniors, to understand our world and what is coming.

Multidimensional Excellence

John Vaillant successfully combines detailed history, science, and sociology with remarkable storytelling to give an unparalleled understanding of the current state of fire and the implications for modern civilization.

A must read for all humans on the planet.

It explains so much about where we are headed, where we are now, and how we got here.