Backyard Alchemy: On Life with Other Creatures in a Time of Salvage - Paperback

by J. D. Ho (Author)

J.D. Ho's Backyard Alchemy transforms the loss of climate stability, relationships, health, and ecological integrity into sites of repair and restoration. Whether about microforaging pennycress and sheep sorrel
in the fields, picking pawpaws in the woods, or salvaging scrap metal by a degraded creek, these lyric essays delve into the personal and historical meanings of local ecologies. They explore locations from the Virginia woods to the Los Angeles River, from the Big Island of Hawai'i to Darwin's England and Guangdong Province, China, crouching down to look at the world from the point of view of a stinkbug, a crayfish, a tree of heaven, revealing the ways that empathy can connect us to even the smallest and most denigrated inhabitants of our planet.