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World of Wonders
184 pages
A tender and curious exploration of how the natural world's most unusual creatures can teach us how to belong.
What it feels like
Reading this collection of essays feels like taking a leisurely, observant walk alongside a deeply curious friend. The mood is tender and wonder-filled, inviting the reader to pause and appreciate the strange and unlovely corners of the natural world. Blending zoology and botany with personal memoir, the prose is reflective and warm, tracing an emotional arc from childhood displacement across various American landscapes to a profound sense of kinship with the earth. It is a book that asks us to look past daily distractions and find guidance in the resilience of axolotls and narwhals. This grounded, appreciative read will delight anyone who loves nature writing that intertwines the scientific with the deeply personal, offering a quiet celebration of finding home wherever you are planted.
- Mood
- wonder-filled
- observant
- grounded
- tender
- Tone
- earnest
- curious
- appreciative
- reflective
- warm
- Pace
- leisurely
- Themes
- finding kinship in nature · childhood and belonging · the beauty of the strange · cultivating wonder · navigating hostile environments
- The writing
- Observant and deeply appreciative, blending personal anecdote with vivid natural history.
- The arc
- Moves from feelings of awkwardness and displacement to a grounded sense of belonging and wonder through connection with the natural world.
- Who it's for
- Readers who love lyrical nature writing intertwined with personal memoir and reflections on identity and belonging.
Content notes
- feelings of displacement
- unkindness
About the book
A collection of essays about the natural world, and the way its inhabitants can teach, support, and inspire us.
As a child, Nezhukumatathil called many places home: the grounds of a Kansas mental institution, where her Filipina mother was a doctor; the open skies and tall mountains of Arizona, where she hiked with her Indian father; and the chillier climes of western New York and Ohio. But no matter where she was transplanted – no matter how awkward the fit or forbidding the landscape – she was able to turn to our world's fierce and funny creatures for guidance.
“What the peacock can do,” she tells us, “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. Even in the strange and the unlovely, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship. 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.
Description from Open Library.
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