The Living Great Lakes: Searching for the Heart of the Inland Seas

(Paperback)

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Description

Now with a new introduction. The story of the Great Lakes unfolds during an epic journey on The Malabar, a two-masted schooner the author helped sail from Lake Michigan to Bar Harbor, Maine. Battling storms and internal strife, the crew of five navigate the lakes and their connecting waterways, traverse the Erie Canal and a flooding Hudson River, and make their way around Manhattan to Long Island Sound and up the Atlantic coast to Maine. Awards include the 2004 Sigurd Olson Nature Writing Award, the Best Book of the Year from the Outdoor Writers Association of America, the Stuart D. and Vernice Gross Award for Excellence in Literature, and the Great Lakes Culture Award. The book was also a finalist for the Great Lakes Booksellers Association's Book of the Year and was selected as a 2004 Michigan Notable Book by the Michigan Library Association. A perennial favorite of book clubs across the U.S. and Canada, it has been a community reads selection more than a dozen times, including the 2009 "Traverse City [MI] Reads," the 2010 "Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads," and the 2015 "Reading Together" selection for Kalamazoo [MI].

Reviews

"An enticing homecoming party for the Great Lakes, with a welcome-back for some readers and an invitation for others." --Kirkus Reviews

"A stirring account of a schooner voyage through some of the most beautiful scenery on the planet." -- Globe and Mail (Canada).

"Thoroughly entertaining." -Chicago Sun Times

"A masterwork. This is history at its best." -- Doug Stanton, author of In Harm's Way

"Dennis weaves anecdotes from his childhood, such as a family-fishing trip on Lake Michigan, together with informed commentary on the natural history of the lakes and the people who live there as well as evocative descriptions of the enchanting view of the forests along Lake Superior from the schooner. " --Publishers Weekly

"A fine guide, borne along with a storyteller's sense of pacing and blend of fact with picaresque." --American Geographical Society

Author Bio

JERRY DENNIS writes about nature and the outdoors for such publications as Sports Afield, Gray's Sporting Journal, and The New York Times. His previous books have been widely praised and have been translated into five languages. He lives in Traverse City, Michigan.