Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This book was terrifying. Even nearly sixty years later, Carson’s cry for caution as we drench our fragile world in powerful chemicals – though often for the best of reasons; stopping multitudinous deaths by insect-born diseases and preventing staggering crop losses to various herbaceous predators – cuts to the heart of an issue that still plagues us today: our powerful chemical helpers may be causing serious problems. Maybe. We don’t know.
Starting off with quick, easy to follow overviews of biology and chemistry, Silent Spring spends a chapter each on the pesticide-threatened areas: ground water, soil, plants, rivers, and animals. You would think that would be the end of it but it goes deeper. Cells. Bacteria. Cancer. Each page brings new layers of side effects and unintended consequences. After almost sixty years, you would hope that none of this would be relevant anymore. This is not necessarily the case.
Pro-tip: Don’t read the first few chapters while eating.
Terrifying.
Tree Slices 
I’m such a wuss. I keep buying books such as An Inconvenient Truth and This Changes Everything and now this one, but I chicken out when it comes to reading them because I’m too scared that they will depress me. Perhaps I should wish that they depress me enough that I take action as opposed to inaction?
LikeLike
Maybe? I think it’s important to recognize your own emotional limits as to how much depressing information you can take in and not overdo it, but I don’t know where the line is between informing yourself about important but depressing things and not recognizing when you’ve bitten off more than you can chew.
LikeLike