Read Outside: Mahoosuc Land Trust’s Story Time and Book Picks
We recently corresponded with our friends at Mahoosuc Land Trust, and they have some wonderful news!
They will be hosting a weekly community story time at Valentine Farm Conservation Center every Saturday from May through October at 3 PM.
Our very own Library Director will be reading on May 16th!
To make things even better, we asked them a question: If their organization could recommend ten books that would be most significant or useful for their patrons, clients, or staff, which ones would they choose? Our goal at the library is to bring meaningful resources to our community, and we can’t wait to share MLT’s awesome recommendations!
So, here’s their list, along with how the Bethel Library can help you get your hands on these delightful titles. Happy reading, everyone!
How To Love a Forest by Ethan Tapper
A tender and fearless exploration of our relationship with forests and ecosystems. This book is part of the physical collection at the Bethel Library.
Reading the Forested Landscape by Tom Wessels
Wessels teaches the reader to study a landscape the way they might solve a mystery. Each chapter addresses a form of forest disturbance common in New England--fire, logging, and blight are examples--and depicts it in an extraordinary, full-page etching. This book is available through interlibrary loan from our consortium libraries. To learn more about interlibrary loan, reach out to our staff or check out our borrowing page.
North Woods by Daniel Mason
This sweeping novel about a single house in the woods of New England, told through the lives of those who inhabit it across the centuries, is available in the library’s physical collection as well as on the cloudLibrary in both ebook and audiobook formats. Let us know if you have questions about the cloudLibrary app. We’d love to get you connected!
Letters to a Young Spoon Carver by Peter Forbes
"Letters to a Young Spoon Carver is a critical read for anyone interested in healing the wounds of American colonialism and its impact on the homelands of the indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands. These letters provide the foundation for a movement that shows a path forward that may indeed be a necessary step to help ensure a sustainable human existence on Mother Earth. This book is passed hand to hand, person to person, and cannot be purchased. To request your copy, please simply reach out to info@knollfarm.org. The Bethel Library Director requested a copy and will put it in one of the Little Free Libraries around Bethel. Can you find it?
Braiding Sweetgrass by Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer
Drawing on her life as an indigenous scientist, and as a woman, Kimmerer shows how other living beings―asters and goldenrod, strawberries and squash, salamanders, algae, and sweetgrass―offer us gifts and lessons, even if we've forgotten how to hear their voices. This book is available at the library in both the original text and the publication designed for young adults. You can find the ebook and audiobook formats on the cloudLibrary.
Nature's Best Hope by Doug Tallamy
This book shows how homeowners everywhere can turn their yards into conservation corridors that provide wildlife habitats. Because this approach relies on the initiatives of private individuals, it is immune from the whims of government policy. Even more important, it’s practical, effective, and easy. Find this book at the Bethel Library or on the cloudLibrary as an ebook.
Of Time and Turtles by Sy Montgomery
Hopeful and optimistic, Of Time and Turtles, a moving and inspirational memoir, is an antidote to the instability of our frenzied world. Elegantly blending science, memoir, and philosophy, and drawing on cultures from across the globe, this compassionate portrait of injured turtles and their determined rescuers invites us all to slow down and embrace wildlife conservation as we slip into turtle time. We have this book at the library.
The Light Eaters by Zoë Schlanger
This marvel of a book takes readers into the magical world of plants, as environmental and science reporter Schlanger sublimely shows that they are intelligent beings too. She expertly explains that plants can communicate, hear, and adapt. They’re not trying to mimic humans either; they have their own complex structures and systems. There’s a copy of this title in the Bethel Library collection.
Rambunctious Garden by Emma Marris
A paradigm shift is roiling the environmental world. For decades people have unquestioningly accepted the idea that our goal is to preserve nature in its pristine, pre-human state. But many scientists have come to see this as an outdated dream that thwarts bold new plans to save the environment and prevents us from having a fuller relationship with nature. Humans have changed the landscapes they inhabit since prehistory, and climate change means even the remotest places now bear the fingerprints of humanity. Emma Marris argues convincingly that it is time to look forward and create the "rambunctious garden," a hybrid of wild nature and human management. You can find this book at the Bethel Library.