Far from Tame: Reflections from the Heart of a Continent

Far from Tame: Reflections from the Heart of a Continent by Allmann, Laurie. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780816626083.

The natural landscapes of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan encompass sand dunes and salt marshes, forests and prairies, cliffs and flatlands of ancient bedrock, and the inland seas of the Great Lakes. In Far from Tame, essayist and naturalist Laurie Allmann uses personal narrative to explore the rich and diverse ecoregions of the Great Lakes states. Beautifully illustrated with scratchboard art by Evan Cantor, Far from Tame provides an alternate map of this region, charting new boundaries based on natural communities and ecosystems. Allmann writes of tallgrass and brush prairies, mountain rainshadows and Lake Superior storms, savannas and blufflands, green-eyed dragonflies, black bear migrations, beech trees, and land still rising from the weight of glaciers. The sites she visits range from the grasslands of western Minnesota to the shores of Lake Erie with stops along the way at the Door Peninsula, the dunes of Lake Michigan, and Drummond Island.