Blue Desert

This author follows in the footsteps of Edward Abbey (and many others) who accepts nature "as it is" and finds glory in that acceptance. This is a fabulous book, and I'm surprised it is so under appreciated--perhaps a result of not having been promoted very well.

I read this in a college class years ago. Since then the book has stayed with me. I grew up in Arizona and when I left it I found that this book was one of the things that guided my rememberences of it. When moved back to Arizona over a decade later I reread this book and found it to be even more engaging and relevent. Most Arizonans are new to the state. They have no basis, no connection to it. They bring their values, their limited perspective. They buy a brand new home on the outskirts of Phoenix next to the desert but have no basis for appreciating and understanding their new home. This book provides that reference -- or at least it provides anchors. Those anchors may be dark at times but there's a lot here: guano, Ajo, suicides on tribal lands... Mostly though it is the desert that Bowden explains. "Much like a coal miner's canary, by the time the rest of us realize what he's talking about it may be too late."

That's the best way to describe much of what Bowden writes here, since most of it comes from his time on the police desk at the Tucson Citizen. And it, and his nature essays, are in Abbey's vein without being in any way derivative. Watch him recreate the treks the mojados take across the Sonoran Desert. Here him renarrate some of his crime story coverage. Let him shine a flashlight on a bit of Tucson.

Again, Bowden hands us a mirror, and what we see is ugly. Carving a swathe from Palm Springs to Ajo to Mexico, the author presses us along the eroding path of man and beast in the desert Southwest. Although doomed, a certain eloquence precedes their demise. The book's organization by chapter (Bats, Antelope, Black, Blue and so forth), although uncharacteristic, does nothing to dilute the sting and lingering ache of Bowden's biting exposition.