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We Loved It All: A Memory of Life

We Loved It All: A Memory of Life

by Lydia Millet

W. W. Norton & Company ·2024 ·272 pages
Maybe Someday
Maybe Someday
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43/99

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About This Book

A personal evocation of the glory of nature, our vexed position in the animal kingdom, and the difficulty of adoring what we destroy. Acclaimed novelist Lydia Millet's first work of nonfiction, We Loved It All , is a genre-defying tour de force that makes an impassioned argument for people to see their emotional and spiritual lives as infinitely dependent on the lives of nonhuman beings. Drawing on a quarter-century of experience as an advocate for endangered species at the Center for Biological Diversity, Millet offers intimate portraits of what she calls "the others"―the extraordinary animals with whom we still share the world, along with those already lost. Humans, too, fill this book, as Millet touches on the lives of her world-traveling parents, fascinating partners and friends, and colorful relatives, from diplomats to nut farmers―all figures in the complex tapestry each of us weaves with the surrounding world. Written in the tradition of Annie Dillard or Robert Macfarlane, We Loved It All is an incantatory work that will appeal to anyone concerned about the future of life on earth―including our own.


Reviews

"Seems to be addressed to a particular audience with the hope of inspiring collective action ..."

Lorraine Berry· Los Angeles Times Read review ↗ Maybe Someday

"It's a fascinating book that proves that Millet's narrative brilliance isn't just confined to fiction ..."

Michael Schaub· The Boston Globe Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"A hybrid of memoir, op-ed and scientific abstracts that is bracingly earnest and intermittently engaging, but fails to deliver a cohesive call to action ..."

Cory Oldweiler· The Minneapolis Star Tribune Read review ↗ Maybe Someday

"Mournful and piercingly beautiful, this will stick with readers long after they finish the last page."

Publishers Weekly Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"Still, the author offers a well-written, poignant lament for the greater animal kingdom to which we owe not just our survival as a species but our joy and companionship."

Kirkus Read review ↗ Near the Top

"Marries her comprehensive understanding of our environmental crisis with her command as a deeply emotive narrator, to extraordinary effect."

Caitlin Gibson· The Washington Post Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"In a recalibrating mix of memoir, facts, critique, and passages of elegiac beauty, Millet reflects on our dangerous muddlement and pins hope on the growing impact of one digital advance."

Donna Seaman· Booklist Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

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