A passionate and lyrical work of reportage and advocacy. Lyrical and hugely intelligent. So if you read one book this year, make it Julian Hoffman’s Irreplaceable. I’m not going to dilute that statement with qualifiers (‘If you read one nonfiction book . . .’ or ‘If you like nature books . . .’). It’s too important a book to limit its audience in any way. If the pen really is mightier than the sword, then Julian Hoffman is a knight errant, looking for trouble, a champion of underdogs. The power of Hoffman's book lies in the reporting: he doesn't deal—as many environmentalists do—in generalities and alarmist warnings about what lies ahead for the world, but in the specifics of the here and now. A powerful hymn to humanity engaging with nature . . . [A] remarkable, illuminating book. A terrific book, prescient, serious and urgent with a careful appreciation of not only the places, creatures and people it brings to us, but also the language used to convey them. This book is an object of celebration and commemoration in itself. Powerful, timely, beautifully written and wonderfully hopeful . . . From the North Kent marshes to the mountainous Balkans, Julian Hoffman shines a light on what we had, what we have, and how much we still stand to lose. Unforgettable. Julian Hoffman presents a radical and revelatory perspective on our planet. At a time when the Earth often seems broken beyond repair, this courageous and hopeful book offers life-changing encounters with the more-than-human world. Wonderful, tender and subtle, beautifully written and filled with a calm authority . . . No book has done more to champion the idea that connections between the human and the natural are the lifeblood of everything that matters.

A passionate and lyrical work of reportage and advocacy. Lyrical and hugely intelligent. So if you read one book this year, make it Julian Hoffman’s Irreplaceable. I’m not going to dilute that statement with qualifiers (‘If you read one nonfiction book . . .’ or ‘If you like nature books . . .’). It’s too important a book to limit its audience in any way. If the pen really is mightier than the sword, then Julian Hoffman is a knight errant, looking for trouble, a champion of underdogs. The power of Hoffman's book lies in the reporting: he doesn't deal—as many environmentalists do—in generalities and alarmist warnings about what lies ahead for the world, but in the specifics of the here and now. A powerful hymn to humanity engaging with nature . . . [A] remarkable, illuminating book. A terrific book, prescient, serious and urgent with a careful appreciation of not only the places, creatures and people it brings to us, but also the language used to convey them. This book is an object of celebration and commemoration in itself. Powerful, timely, beautifully written and wonderfully hopeful . . . From the North Kent marshes to the mountainous Balkans, Julian Hoffman shines a light on what we had, what we have, and how much we still stand to lose. Unforgettable. Julian Hoffman presents a radical and revelatory perspective on our planet. At a time when the Earth often seems broken beyond repair, this courageous and hopeful book offers life-changing encounters with the more-than-human world. Wonderful, tender and subtle, beautifully written and filled with a calm authority . . . No book has done more to champion the idea that connections between the human and the natural are the lifeblood of everything that matters.

Julian Hoffman is the author of The Small Heart of Things: Being at Home in a Beckoning World (Georgia), which won the 2012 AWP Award Series for Creative Nonfiction and the National Outdoor Book Award for Natural History Literature. He was also the winner of the Terrain.org Nonfiction Prize and has written for EarthLines, Kyoto Journal, Beloit Fiction Journal, Briar Cliff Review, Flyway, Redwood Coast Review, Silk Road Review, and Southern Humanities Review. He lives in northwestern Greece.