Lost in Austin: The Evolution of an American City by Alex Hannaford
UK journalist passed through Austin and was charmed to the degree that he soon moved there. The city delivered on multiple fronts: a vibrant arts scene, great cheap food, low cost of living and a real sense of community. That Austin has since vanished, swallowed up by rapid urbanization and the effects of gentrification. As a transplanted Brit and a journo at that, who marries and begins to raise a family there, Hannaford has a great outsider’s perspective and the ability to research and express it. You may have never been to Austin nor have any intention on going, so why care? Because what’s happened in Austin has and is happening all over Canada as well; there are lessons to learn here.
Also, I’ve been reading books about urban planning, urbanization, and cities for years: this is the first one with a chapter dedicated to climate change, both in the present, recent past and near future. What was heaven ten years ago is often closer to “the other place” now. (Just think of the fires, floods and heatwaves in BC in the last five years, or the flooding from Hurricane Helene that turned Asheville into an island last week and wiped out much of the idyllic mountain towns of Western North Carolina.)
While this book focuses on Austin, there’s a strong likelihood most readers will strongly relate to this book thanks to what’s currently happening in their own communities. An entertaining read, despite the issues it confronts.
Adult Non-Fiction Hardcover pr7474642
This book is a poetic, haunting keening for the loss of the author’s son, who died from an unexpected seizure in his early 20s. Most of Fuller’s career has dealt with her family, in wildly entertaining memoirs about growing up in South Africa (Don’t Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight). If ever there was a memoir she didn’t want to write…
Inconsolable, Fuller doesn’t know what to do with herself after the loss, and travels up and down the Rocky Mountains making stops at a silent meditation retreat in Alberta, a grief sanctuary in New Mexico, and lives in a shepherd’s wagon in Wyoming, trying to process what’s happened. While the subject and emotions expressed here can be very painful to read, Fuller’s beautiful writing enfolds one and carries you along. It hurts, but feels necessary somehow, like a conversation or the journal of a close friend. Beautiful and profound.
Adult Non-Fiction Hardcover pr7451942