World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks and Other Astonishments

Description

"What the peacock can do is remind you of a home you will run away from and run back to all your life." The axolotl teaches us to smile, even in the face of unkindness; the touch-me-not plant shows us how to shake off unwanted advances; the narwhal demonstrates how to survive in hostile environments. In her nonfiction debut, award-winning poet Aimee Nezhukumatathil explores the many places she has called home, from inhospitable plains to tall mountains in big sky country. No matter where she is transplanted, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship, even in the strange and the unlovely. For it is this way with wonder: it requires that we are curious enough to look past the distractions in order to fully appreciate the world's gifts.

Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of four collections of poems, including Oceanic, winner of the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Award. Her writing appears in Poetry, The New York Times Magazine and Tin House. She serves as poetry faculty for the Writing Workshops in Greece, and is professor of English and creative writing in the University of Mississippi's MFA program. This is her first work of nonfiction.

'Within two pages, nature writing feels different and fresh and new. Nezhukumatathil has written a timely story about love, identity and belonging ... We are losing the language and the ability to see and understand the wondrous things around us. And our lives are impoverished by this process ... This book demands we find the eyes to see and the heart to love such things once more. It is a very fine book indeed, truly full of wonder.' - James Rebanks, New York Times Book Review 'Aimee Nezhukumatathil's World of Wonders is the first book to make me feel like a firefly as much as it reminds me I'm still a black boy playing in Central Mississippi woods. The book walks. It sprints. It leaps. Most importantly, the book lingers in a world where power, people, and the literal outside wrestle painfully, beautifully. This book is a world of wonders. This book is about to shake the Earth.' - Kiese Laymon 'Sometimes we need teachers who remind us how to be flabbergasted and gobsmacked and flummoxed and enswooned by the wonders of this earth. How to be in stupefied and devotional love to the wonders of this earth. How to be in love with this, our beloved earth. Aimee Nezhukumatathil's World of Wonders is as good and generous a teacher as one could ever ask for. This book enraptures with its own astonishments and reveries while showing us how to be enraptured, how to revere. Which, again, is showing us how to be in love. I can think of nothing more important. Or wonderful.' - Ross Gay, author of The Books of Delights 'From its gorgeous illustrations to its unusual combination of lyrical nature writing and memoir, World of Wonders is hands-down one of the most beautiful books of the year.' - NPR "Best Books of 2020"