Cover of The Best of Edward Abbey

The Best of Edward Abbey

This book is a collection of thirty-one fiction and nonfiction pieces, selected by one of America's most popular and celebrated authors, including selections from his best-sellers The Monkey Wrench Gang, Desert Solitaire, The Brave Cowboy, Abbey's Road, Down the River, The Journey Home, and others. This gathering, which has the distinction of being both authored and edited by Abbey, provides a unity and consistency not found in any other collections.

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Those unfamiliar with Abbey will find this the ideal single-volume introduction to his work, while those who know his writing will treasure this reminder of the range of his talent. Abbey's writing - powerful, idiosyncratic, raunchy, eloquent, passionate, and profoundly honest - made him a unique voice among nature writers and brought him a wide following.

"The Best of Edward Abbey" is filled with laughter at human foibles, rage at human folly, and abiding love for what Abbey calls "this delicate planet circling around the sun which humankind calls Earth."

Audience
adult
Length
long · 458 pages

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Liked The Best of Edward Abbey? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked The Best of Edward Abbey. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. One Life at a Time, Please Shares essays, nonfiction, environment
  2. Sex and the River Styx Shares essays, nonfiction, nature
  3. Our Only World: Ten Essays Shares essays, nature, nonfiction
  4. Edward Abbey: A Life Shares nature, environment, nonfiction

“People who read The Best of Edward Abbey tend to reach for these next.”

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“If you want more of the same (philosophy about environment), start with these.”

  1. Wildbranch: An Anthology of Nature, Environmental, and Place-based Writing
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  4. The Colors of Nature: Culture, Identity, and the Natural World

“If it was the essays that hooked you, try one of these.”

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  2. Islands, the Universe, Home
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  4. The Journey Home: Some Words in Defense of the American West

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

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