Rising Fire: Volcanoes and Our Inner Lives

John Calderazzo has written a book in "Rising Fires: Volcanoes and Our Inner Lives" that is not a scientific treatise on geology, but a personal account of the human relationship to these fire-breathing phenomena. The result is a charming series of vignettes on smoking mountains old and new from Vesuvius and Etna to Paricutin, Popocateptl, Pelee and Shasta. I have lived in the vicinity of inactive volcanoes for much of my life and in 1999 I flew over Popocateptl while it was smoking, the clouds just lifting enough to show the nearly perfect and almost snow-free cone of Popo and the blade-like (and snow-covered) summit of Iztaccihuatl. It was a very awe-inspiring sight! Earlier aerial views of Mt. Shasta, Mt. Hood, Mt. St. Helens and the rest of the chain of Cascade volcanoes were also quite impressive, although none of them were erupting at the time. Calderazzo has captured the human connection with these impossible to stop forces of nature. Lava flows and explosive eruptions do not stop for any of our puny wishes that they would. A volcano is a truly irresistible force, destroying with ease, yet leaving fertile soil that is very tempting for cultivators. A vast amount of stories and folklore has build up about them and this book takes us on a personal tour of some of the most interesting "live" and "dead" mountains of fire. The author has an interesting style, holding the reader spell- bound with his descriptions of geological processes and the human response to them. I did find a few irritating typos, but generally the book reads well and I cannot imagine anyone being disappointed in it. If you are at all interested in our earth and how humans relate to it, this is a very good book to read.

"More and more often, when I sit at home in simple meditation, just following my breath, I sense the enormity of so much that I miss, the subtle physical relationships that swirl around me all the time." Caderazzo writes this - and it reminds me how I often feel the same - which reminds me why I read in general - and why I like this book in particular. This is terrific - you'll like it if you have some sort of interest in volcanoes, but also, if you're just interested in an exploration into the human heart and the natural world and some of the things we all miss - those things that we look to others to point out to us, and that once seen, make us more alive.