This is a small and shameless plug for a book I think is very important. It's one of the last books I worked on editorially and will always be one that I'm most proud of having been involved with. The book tells two stories, one of the growing water crisis and the other the Bushmen's fight for survival. Workman seamless weaves these two tales together and makes us remember that we are all connected and all impacted. Water isn't a Bushman problem, it's a global issue and we all need to pay attention.
There are some really frightening and enlightening stories and statistics in the book...I was most intrigued by T. Boone Pickens and water rights. It'll open your eyes and I suspect that you'll never take quite as long a shower or leave the water run so long when brushing your teeth after reading Heart of Dryness. It's a wake-up call...but one cleverly disguised as a compelling read. You will finish this book buoyed by the spirit of the Bushmen and the knowledge that there are things we can all do.
James Workman's website is www.heartofdryness.com and the book is available at your favorite local bookseller, online and I believe at his website, too. A short blurb from the publisher's website www.walkerbooks.com follows. Do check it out, the book will be released tomorrow (4 August) so get your copy. (No, I'm not on commission, I just feel this is an important book.)
James G. Workman
We don't govern water. Water governs us," writes James G. Workman. In Heart of Dryness, he chronicles the memorable saga of the famed Bushmen of the Kalahari "remnants of one of the world's most successful civilizations, today at the exact epicenter of Africa's drought” in their widely publicized recent battle with the government of Botswana, in the process of exploring the larger story of what many feel has become the primary resource battleground of the twenty-first century: the supply of water.
The Bushmen's story could well prefigure our own. In the United States, even the most upbeat optimists concede we now face an unprecedented water crisis. Reservoirs behind large dams on the Colorado River, which serve thirty million in many states, will be dry in thirteen years. Southeastern drought recently cut Tennessee Valley Authority hydropower in half, exposed Lake Okeechobee's floor, dried up thousands of acres of Georgia's crops, and left Atlanta with sixty days of water. Cities east and west are drying up. As reservoirs and aquifers fail, officials ration water, neighbors snitch on one another, corporations move in, and states fight states to control shared rivers.
Each year, around the world, inadequate water kills more humans than AIDS, malaria, and all wars combined. Global leaders pray for rain. Bushmen tap more pragmatic solutions. James G. Workman illuminates the present and coming tensions we will all face over water and shows how, from the remoteness of the Kalahari, an ancient and resilient people is showing the world a viable path through the encroaching Dry Age.
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