"[Woods] melodic voice seems to smile while describing the influences of wind on life forms, geography, and
our planet's environment. The narrator's cheerfully pedantic delivery suits a book in which science is mixed
with the author's own life experiences."--AudioFile
"This is nature writing at its most expansive and rewarding."--Booklist
"The wind will never be the same for [listeners] after finishing this book, its presence now heightened and
explicated. DeBlieu has achieved the Big Two: enlightenment and high entertainment."--Kirkus
Reviews
Siroccos, Santa Anas, chinooks, monsoons, the wind has as many names as moods. Few other forces have so
universally shaped the lands and waters of the earth, the plants and animals, the patterns of exploration,
settlement, and civilization.
Few other phenomena have exerted such a profound influence on the history and psyche of humankind. Wind
touches all of us every day of our lives, yet remarkably little has been written about it except as a component
of the weather. In Wind, Jan DeBlieu brings a poet's voice and a scientist's eye to this remarkable
natural force, showing how the bumping of a few molecules can lead to the creation of religious, the discovery
of continents, and the destruction of empires.
DeBlieu visits the water observatory at the summit of Mount Washington, where some of the highest wind
speeds in the world have been recorded. She talks to survivors of a deadly tornado in Iowa, tries hang gliding
over North Carolina's Outer Banks, climbs sand dunes in Oregon and slickrock formations in Utah-everywhere
exploring the effects, subtle and brutal, comforting and terrifying, of the wind.
