World of Wonders

Maybe I'm just a sucker for nature writing. What we have here is a collection of essays using nature as a a springboard. Talk of peacocks, corpse flowers and fireflies are a useful jumping off point to discuss growing up a latchkey kid, reflecting on otherness and what love means. All with the thoughtful and reverent wonder of a poet. It is a deft exploration of our connected lives and how nature, when considered more closely, can frame our experiences without devolving into cloying bromides and crunchy platitudes.

Fumi Nakamura provides the accompanying illustrations that preface most of the stories — and while beautiful, they don't fully express the biting sharpness of her original artistic works that are certainly worth checking out.