Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
McKibben's (Maybe One) large-scale battle against the Keystone XL pipeline and Big Oil is set against stories of a beekeeping friend in Vermont. This comparison helps drive home McKibben's message about serving humanity by both working toward legislation and in our own backyard helping to limit climate change. Listeners will learn all of the important facts about global warming and may be inspired to use a bicycle more often. Amazing facts about bees and their importance to our survival will leave listeners reconsidering whether to swat at the next one they see. Kevin T. Collins wonderfully captures the author's emotion in his narration. VERDICT Highly recommended for newbies as well as those knowledgeable about climate change. ["Moving, brief, and readable, McKibben's story will appeal to a broad range of readers," concurred the review of the Times: Holt hc, LJ 10/1/13.]-Sean Kennedy, Cleveland Marshall Coll. Law Lib. (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
From the founder of the environmental organization 350.org, a chatty, warm memoir of his double life as globe-trotting activist and part-time novice beekeeper. For the past couple of years, McKibben (Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet, 2010, etc.) has juggled two careers: organizing campaigns to halt the degradation of the planet and working with Kirk Webster, a beekeeper whose farm in the Champlain Valley of Vermont the author helped finance. Fighting the Keystone XL pipeline has been a top priority, and the author writes with humor of the three days he spent in jail in Washington, D.C., as the leader of a major demonstration against it. He also writes from the heart about the disastrous recent floods that struck his beloved Vermont and New York City, giving the country a look at the increasing devastation of climate change. McKibben, who asserts that the fossil fuel industry is poisoning the planet and that its donations have turned one of our political parties into climate deniers and the other into cowards, advocates that what has been a political fight must now take a new economic direction: divestment in these companies. In the latter part of the book, the author focuses on his efforts to take this message to colleges across the country, whose portfolios have large investments in the fossil fuel industry. McKibben intersperses his accounts of his intense and wide-ranging efforts as an environmental activist with his sometimes-humbling experiences as a novice beekeeper, learning from Webster the art and science of raising bees and making honey. The author's clear message: Hard work is required on both the local level and the larger scale if the fight to protect our planet is not to be lost. A personal, enjoyably rancor-free account, filled with praise for his colleagues and some pokes at opponents but void of harangues.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.
*Starred Review* As global warming accelerates, McKibben, who has been writing about climate change and fossil fuels for 25 years, has stepped up his innovative activism even though all he really wants to do is stay home in Vermont and appreciate nature's magnificent choreography. The title of his fifteenth book encapsulates the two lives he juxtaposes in this confiding and dramatic chronicle of environmental action in the Internet age, especially his founding of the nimble and impactful organization 350.org. On the oil front, McKibben illuminates the thinking behind and courage involved in protests against the Keystone XL pipeline, including his time in jail. Honey refers to his collaboration with beekeeper Kirk Webster, whose dream was to establish a chemical-free apiary and share his sustainable bee-raising techniques. McKibben eloquently contrasts the deep benefits of Webster's work with the unconscionable risks of tar-sands oil production and the toxicity of Washington politics. In this moving, wryly amusing account set against the heated presidential campaign of 2012, McKibben describes his extraordinary world travels and what it took to launch gutsy, creative, and effective protests, and shares invaluable information and such intriguing insights as what bees can teach us about reaching consensus. Galvanizing and inspiring.--Seaman, Donna Copyright 2010 Booklist
Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Long a reasoned voice for protection of our planet's natural resources, McKibben (distinguished scholar, Middlebury Coll.) chronicles his journey from environmental writer to social activist in spearheading protests of the planned Canadian-U.S. Keystone XL oil pipeline set to run from Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico. McKibben brilliantly and sometimes hilariously contrasts his own struggles to organize nationwide protests against the pipeline project with his narrative of a neighboring Vermont beekeeper who strives to simplify his life and lessen his impact upon the planet's threatened resources. The self-proclaimed "accidental author-activist" describes hours of organizational obstacles and tireless work by hundreds of volunteers, culminating in over 1,000 arrests at the White House in August 2011. Subsequently, protestors formed a human chain around the White House to try to convince President Obama to cancel the pipeline project. McKibben poignantly conveys his love of family and the rural Vermont land from which he is separated in the months he spends on the road. VERDICT Moving, brief, and readable, McKibben's story will appeal to a broad range of readers, from those with a general interest in environmental affairs and social movements to those committed to environmental protection and the power of moral witness in our society.-John Creech, Central Washington Univ. Lib., Ellensburg (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.