America's Wild Read

Do you enjoy reading books that will change your life, if you let them? Do you like the idea of being a part of a community of like-minded, open-hearted people? Will you take this journey seriously, and have some fun too? You have come to the right place! 

Image Details

About Us

America’s Wild Read is the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Library's virtual, quarterly book club where we aim to inspire you to connect with the outdoors and nature through conservation literature. We hope you will read along with us as we feature various conservation books every quarter — contemporary, traditional, new, and classic.

Our book selections may include titles about the history of conservation, climate change climate change
Climate change includes both global warming driven by human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases and the resulting large-scale shifts in weather patterns. Though there have been previous periods of climatic change, since the mid-20th century humans have had an unprecedented impact on Earth's climate system and caused change on a global scale.

Learn more about climate change , a species and the challenges it faces, or books that impart how we can be better stewards of the natural world. In the past we've featured books like Braiding Sweetgrass, The Home Place and Silent Spring. 

Our book discussions are open to anyone who likes to read, wants to learn more about conservation, U.S Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) employees and the public. Everyone is welcome! Even if you have not read or finished the book selection yet, please join us for these informal conversations about conservation literature, where we reflect on the text, answer discussion questions, and foster connections with one another.

Get Involved 

We encourage you all to grow in your knowledge of conservation literature as you read these Wild Read titles because we all have a responsibility to nature and to steward our natural resources, plants, lands, and animals. Read along with us each season and learn from our selected titles of conservation literature. Stay up to date on Wild Read news here to see book announcements, discussion questions, and book discussion events.

Each quarter we host a book discussion open to Service employees and the public, you don't have to have read the book to participate in these discussions, anyone is welcome. It is an informal book club-like atmosphere where we reflect on the reading, answer discussion questions, and enjoy some time together through a conversation on conservation literature. We hope you join us and share your thoughts and perspectives from the reading.

If you'd like to participate in our book club and join our Wild Read Community, email catherine_blalack@fws.gov.  

Image Details

Announcing this Spring's Wild Read

Spring 2023: Refuge An Unnatural History of Family and Place by Terry Tempest Williams

This spring for America’s Wild Read, the USFWS Library is featuring an environmental literature classic, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place by award-winning author, Terry Tempest Williams. Being a Utah native, Terry grew up knowing Great Salt Lake, Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, and the thousands of birds that migrate through and became her refuge and sanctuary. Both the landscape of her childhood and the landscape of her family, the bedrocks of her life, are subjected to change in this work first published in 1992. The author contemplates the threats facing Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, altered by rising levels of the Great Salt Lake and her journey of loss as her mother battles ovarian cancer.  

Terry Tempest Williams is an author, naturalist and activist who writes about her love of her environments, her own personal experiences, and the preservation of wildness. She is known for her heartfelt lyrical prose and has won the Robert Kirsch Award, a lifetime achievement prize given to a writer with a substantial connection to the American West, as well as the Audubon New York Award for Environmental Writing. She invites us into her own journey through grief and loss and shows readers the land through her eyes with, noting the wonder of wings in flight, noticing every detail of birds including their gemstone-colored eyes, or the peculiar spinning behavior of a Wilson’s phalarope. Her observations of nature and wildlife encourage the reader to slow down and live each day richly, and ultimately find refuge in wild places.  

If you are an FWS employee, you can access an eBook of Refuge via this link. FWS employees may also email catherine_blalack@fws.gov to borrow a print copy as available. For the general public, Refuge can be found at your local library or bookstore. 

Come join us for our upcoming online book discussion on Thursday, May 18 at 3 PM EST. Please register in advance. The Wild Read book club meetings are a place where the readers should come ready to reflect on the reading, answer discussion questions, and enjoy some time together through a conversation on conservation literature. We hope you join us and share your thoughts and perspectives from the reading.  

Previous Book Selections 

Selection Process