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Seasons: Desert Sketches
The late writer and naturalist Ellen Meloy wrote and recorded a series of audio essays for KUER, NPR Utah in the 1990s. Every few months, she would travel to their Salt Lake City studios from her red rock home of Bluff to read an essay or two. With understated humor and sharp insight, Meloy would illuminate facets of human connection to nature and challenge listeners to examine the world anew. Seasons: Desert Sketches is a compilation of these essays, transcribed from their original cassette tape recordings. Whether Meloy is pondering geese in Desolation Canyon or people at the local post office, readers will delight in her signature wit and charm—and feel the pull of the desert she loves and defends. With a foreword by Annie Proulx.
84 pages, Paperback
Published April 16, 2019
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About the author
Ellen Meloy
10Ìýbooks99ÌýfollowersEllen Meloy was an American nature writer. Among the awards she garnered are the Whiting Writer's Award (1997) and the John Burroughs Medal (2007); in 2003 she was also nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, for The Anthropology of Turquoise Meditations on Landscape, Art & Spirit.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 53 reviews
January 18, 2019
What a wonderful, essential little book. I wish Ellen Meloy were still with us to share her wry commentary on the political shenanigans playing out in today’s version of the West. Still, we have these short essays, which probably provide whatever answers we’d be looking for from her anyway. Reading this collection is a gift, and I’m filled with a budding urge to move to, and lose myself in, Ellen’s desert.
October 14, 2020
This is one of those books you want to buy a bunch of copies to give to everyone and tell everyone about. Meloy is an underappreciated author known in smaller circles than Abbey but with just as much wit and appreciation for the Utah desert and the natural environment.
This collection of essays might be my favorite collection of hers (so far, I haven't read all her works yet). It was essays she wrote and read on NPR in SLC. Most are two pages. It's the type of book you think you'll read quickly through as it's not much over 100 pages but instead you savor it, reading a few essays a day. It's set up in the seasons she wrote them. I underlined so many passages. I feel she lets her humorous side show more in these essays than in some of her other works. She has a way of transporting you to a time and place even in such a short essay. This is a treasured collection
This collection of essays might be my favorite collection of hers (so far, I haven't read all her works yet). It was essays she wrote and read on NPR in SLC. Most are two pages. It's the type of book you think you'll read quickly through as it's not much over 100 pages but instead you savor it, reading a few essays a day. It's set up in the seasons she wrote them. I underlined so many passages. I feel she lets her humorous side show more in these essays than in some of her other works. She has a way of transporting you to a time and place even in such a short essay. This is a treasured collection
May 5, 2019
“To earn this unfamiliar world, it’s darkness and its light, I had to follow the contours: slow down, pay attention, stay local, go deep. East, west, or in-between, relation to the land is the core of home.�
January 28, 2019
Very good nonfiction work.
She lived in wilderness with her husband and her writing has deep fragnance of wilderness and nature she herself inhaled.
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Rare talent of putting on paper the crystal care processing of truth and natural beauty.
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Author talks about connection between nature and man and how everything is misinterpreted by modernity.
.
These essays by renowned late environmental author; Ellen Meloy.
.
.
She has great gift of feeling nature, grabbing its pulse and then transmitting her noble message in a humorous and informative way.
.
Book is small, crisp, interesting and awesome.
Writing is enjoyable and engaging and it brings its descriptives to life.
.
She talks about frogs, mooses, snakes, FBI, elections, TV, ice fishing, bears, guns and lots of interesting stuff.
.
.Finally she emphasises that man is also an animal and should work to keep natural balance intact.
Thanks publisher and edelweiss plus for review copy.
She lived in wilderness with her husband and her writing has deep fragnance of wilderness and nature she herself inhaled.
.
Rare talent of putting on paper the crystal care processing of truth and natural beauty.
.
Author talks about connection between nature and man and how everything is misinterpreted by modernity.
.
These essays by renowned late environmental author; Ellen Meloy.
.
.
She has great gift of feeling nature, grabbing its pulse and then transmitting her noble message in a humorous and informative way.
.
Book is small, crisp, interesting and awesome.
Writing is enjoyable and engaging and it brings its descriptives to life.
.
She talks about frogs, mooses, snakes, FBI, elections, TV, ice fishing, bears, guns and lots of interesting stuff.
.
.Finally she emphasises that man is also an animal and should work to keep natural balance intact.
Thanks publisher and edelweiss plus for review copy.
November 29, 2023
Love Ellen Meloy's writing, and it's a shame she didn't live to fill more books with her humor and insight. This collection was material from her radio spots at Salt Lake City's KUER back in the 90s.
Some of the material she used in her books, but there was some previously unpublished material, too. What's surprising is that it's not very dated. Most of it could have aired this year and been right in step with our times.
Some of the material she used in her books, but there was some previously unpublished material, too. What's surprising is that it's not very dated. Most of it could have aired this year and been right in step with our times.
June 26, 2020
This book is not my cup of tea. It’s a book of essays that were originally written for the radio. The author was making everyday observations about the world around her. Some were funny like the bread dough, and others thoughtful. Each is just a few pages long. The book wasn’t bad, but I think I would have enjoyed them more if I heard them from her lips rather than read them from her fingers.
#Popsugar #western
#BeattheBacklist #companionnovel
#Popsugar #western
#BeattheBacklist #companionnovel
December 10, 2019
A lawn is an endless cycle of doomed ecology.
Through the window of river lies a path to the true stories of place.
Through the window of river lies a path to the true stories of place.
October 31, 2022
A nice collection of essays. My favorite thing is that she reads these herself. She has a wonderful gift for language and description of the southwest and hearing her words from her mouth is a nice, natural experience. The Anthropologie of Turquoise is one of my favorites but I've not ventured into her other books. This was a nice reminder that I need to spend the time to read the other things she's written.
December 21, 2023
I bought this book while on a solo hiking getaway with my dog in Kanab, UT. It is a place that gave me the peace that only nature can give. This book does the same thing for me. I continually go back to it when I need to step off the hamster wheel of life and just read some beautiful, humorous observations about the absurdities in life to which we can all relate. I love Ellen Meloy’s writing style and her keen sense of observation; her directness and clear-eyed view of the world; her humor, which makes me laugh out loud.
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November 8, 2022
Beautifully written essays
January 19, 2019
In these short sketches written to be read on public radio, Ellen Meloy takes you with her to the desert, to the rodeo, and even to the post office, where she makes observations with respect and with humor. It's worth every bit of the short time it takes to read it.
July 16, 2019
A delightful recovery of short essays, each of which is a gem, by a writer whose early death was a great loss to the West.
April 10, 2019
Ellen Meloy leaves us with wonderful essays that are full of sensitivity, humor, and unique observations about the desert life she embraced. Her descriptions and language are at times both beautiful and startling. That is everything one can want from someone who revels in the natural world and those who are open to its beauties and contradictions. Meloy shared her essays on local radio stations not far from her home in Bluff. When you read and enjoy this book, you will want to gift it to a friend. Please do so, as her words and thoughts continue to inspire.
December 18, 2021
This is a collection of short essays written for radio. It was published after Meloy's early death as a way to preserve every scrap of her writing. She has a way of describing human connection to nature- she's wry and insightful, humorous and sometimes cranky. Each essay is only one to two pages but Meloy quickly pulls you into her desert scenes. She's become a favorite writer of mine.
June 13, 2019
Trenchant, witty. I want everyone to read this.
September 1, 2020
Pay attention to the weather, to what breaks your heart, to what lifts your heart. Write it down.
June 16, 2020
I've read all of Ellen Meloy's books. This is a short book of her essays on the natural world, mostly, though not exclusively, written from the area of southern Utah she lived in before her untimely death in 2004. Meloy writes beautifully about the natural world that surrounds her but she's also very funny, as well as biting. I loved the essay on lawns. 'In Utah, God wants you to have a lawn. An unkempt, weedy yard around a house can mean only one thing: the person inside is dead.' As I'm writing this during a drought (and lockdown) in South-East England, this essay had me in stitches, especially as my partner and I are constantly complaining how much people cut their lawns and hedges here (all bad for wildlife). Meloy can be funny but she is also making a serious point. In other essays she shows her talent for observation. The lamb of a bighorn sheep, for example, reminds her of a 'bursting cattail.'
I will re-read this book as I yearn for long desert vistas.
I will re-read this book as I yearn for long desert vistas.
March 22, 2023
Oh, my heart. Ellen Meloy has a simple but deep way with words, and if you've ever loved a desert they will cut you to your core. In some ways, the works in Seasons remind me of a slightly feral Mary Oliver,
a comparison that feels both apt and not at all apt because I love both authors but each are decidedly their own thing. Anyway, if you've ever loved a desert or a river or a toad, or you think you might like to, or if you've lived the southwest, or loved someplace wild, this book is probably for you.
a comparison that feels both apt and not at all apt because I love both authors but each are decidedly their own thing. Anyway, if you've ever loved a desert or a river or a toad, or you think you might like to, or if you've lived the southwest, or loved someplace wild, this book is probably for you.
May 3, 2022
If I could paint a thousand suns and sip the sand from the rim of the canyon it would not be enough to convey my deep appreciation for this amazing writer. I am bereft - never knowing her, never having the opportunity to say - "Your words from the desert touched the chords of my water-animal soul."
These essays are merely light fare touching on Ellen Meloy's nuanced observations. But absolutely necessary reading.
These essays are merely light fare touching on Ellen Meloy's nuanced observations. But absolutely necessary reading.
December 26, 2019
3.5
Thus author is poetic in her descriptions of nature, much like I’d imagine Wendell Berry is based on what I’ve heard.
It just wasn’t for me. I failed to get the point of her essays. The ones I liked best compared the West she loved so much to other locales, specifically West Virginia and Brooklyn, NY.
Obviously she is a well-loved writer, she just wasn’t for my taste.
Thus author is poetic in her descriptions of nature, much like I’d imagine Wendell Berry is based on what I’ve heard.
It just wasn’t for me. I failed to get the point of her essays. The ones I liked best compared the West she loved so much to other locales, specifically West Virginia and Brooklyn, NY.
Obviously she is a well-loved writer, she just wasn’t for my taste.
May 8, 2020
Ellen Meloy is one of my very favorite essayists and I have read all of her writing. This collection of 26 very short essays that Meloy broadcast on the Salt Lake City NPR affiliate in the 1990s is not her best work, but it may be some of her most witty, biting and humorous. Absolutely worth a read--but make sure you read "The Anthropology of Tourquise," to fully appreciate her skill.
June 29, 2020
I recently discovered Ellen Meloy's books and I've become a big fan. In my opinion, this books is a classic. A seemingly simple book of essays for NPR barely over 8o pages, but each two or three page essay is a great pleasure to read. This book will be riding shotgun with me in my car so I can reflect on the essays during any periods of waiting. For me, this is more inspiring than Walden.
July 12, 2021
Beautiful, warm, witty, and smart collection of 2- to 3-page essays transcribed from the author's radio spots. Meloy has a keen eye not only for the detail of nature but the rhythms of its motion, and her phrasing and self-deprecating sense of humor make it compulsively readable, with page after page of quotable passages.
June 3, 2022
Such a pleasant read! Love this collections of short stories and thoughts. It’s about life at a slower pace and really appreciating the wonders surrounding us all the time. Life before smart phones and social media. Really made me miss those times. I found myself laughing out loud while reading her beautiful writing. Highly recommend for a bedside table to read a little here and there.
September 24, 2022
I enjoyed Meloy's essays about her life in the desert. Because of how short the ones in this book are I found them approachable. But she packs a lot of thought into a short passage with skill. Each reading unpacks new meaning and challenges how I approach nature whether in the remote desert or my patch of suburbia.
January 29, 2020
Consistently in awe of Meloy's ability to make me feel things like presence, longing, and belonging in the span of two pages... if that's not a testament to her humanity, and ability to relate to the world around her in such deep way, I don't know what is. But I'm glad she did.
February 16, 2021
Not what I was expecting but I enjoyed it. Short little stories or comments that were more thought provoking than many of the books I read. Definitely recommend if you like nature writings, Utah deserts, and thinking about random things!
March 16, 2021
Superior. Wonderful, brief, but insightful complete descriptions of life interactions with our landscape and it's inhabitants, animals and the earth, the sky and plant life. Touch, experience and verbalize the moment. Ellen Meloy skas it with humor, understanding and compassion.
February 11, 2022
After Ellen Melody’s sudden death in 2004, her remaining previously unpublished short essays and sketches were gathered into this short book. It’s lovely, but feels incomplete. How could it not? Now I have read everything she ever wrote and I am sad.
February 16, 2022
At times laugh out loud funny, immediately followed by poetic imagery like “They made no distinction between landscape and dreams. It’s how to live in this brutal desert with complete grace.�
Short, vivid, clever stories. A collective delight, and real joy to take my time reading.
Short, vivid, clever stories. A collective delight, and real joy to take my time reading.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 53 reviews
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