American Oasis: Finding the Future in the Cities of the Southwest Audiobook

Quotes

• A phenomenal book. American Oasis is much more than a sweeping and brilliant account of the Southwest. It’s essential reading about our past, present, and—if we have one—future.

  — Andy Borowitz, author of Profiles in Ignorance

• Paoletta, a discerning son of the Southwest, takes us back to the future—that is, to the hotter, drier, crispier future the whole nation can expect if current trends continue. This richly reported work of history and contemporary travelogue tells the epic, fantastical story of five sun-scorched metropolises that, having risen mirage-like from the desert, give us insights into how our urban civilization might survive—even thrive.

  — Hampton Sides, author of The Wide Wide Sea

• These are the hats of Kyle Paoletta: traveler, historian, naturalist, reporter, memoirist, diagnostician, advocate.  All come together in this powerful treatment of the great Southwestern deserts, viewed through their cities and suburbs, a veritable flock of canaries in the coalmine that is climate change. American Oasis tells a complex human story of wisdom and stupidity—but also of possibility and perhaps even hope.

  — Philip J. Deloria, Leverett Saltonstall Professor of History, Harvard University

• A deeply engaging work—superbly written and powerfully researched—American Oasis is destined to play an important role in debates about the future of arid climate survival and the built environment. Paoletta is going on the shelf next to Gretel Ehrlich, Gary Nabhan, Luis Urrea, and other inspiring thinkers who critically consider the West and the complexities of settlement.

  — Raquel Gutiérrez, author of Brown Neon

• American Oasis helps us to understand our hotter, tougher future by showing us how people and civilizations have both thrived (and collapsed) in the desert Southwest over the last thousand years. Paoletta’s deep research and irrepressible personal passion describes a way forward in tune with what has come before.

  — Beto O'Rourke

• In this shimmering and revelatory book, Kyle Paoletta bridges the deep history and future of the Southwest, and somehow connects it all, movingly, to our larger American story. I couldn’t put it down.

  — Ross Andersen, The Atlantic

• A chronicle as twisted and colorful as the region itself, replete with backroom dealers, fearless activists, shameless land-grabbers, and artistic visionaries who have shaped the Southwest. The result is a supremely entertaining, enlivening, and infuriating account of the beauty, injustice, warmth, and weirdness of one of the most misunderstood regions in the United States. Epic.

  — Andrew Leland, author of The Country of the Blind

• Paoletta has written an eye-opening history of a region too many Americans find it convenient to pretend doesn't have one. In the process he shows why the Southwest, in all its contradiction and impossibility, might hold the key to our future. American Oasis is meticulously researched and reported by one of the best young journalists at work today, but what really makes it sing is the deeper knowledge—and love—of a native son.

  — Christopher Beha, author of The Index of Self-Destructive Acts

• American Oasis not only provides a detailed and engaging history, but also a vision of the future through the lessons of the American desert. Paoletta teaches us and, ultimately, compels us to act if we are going to have any future at all.

  — Jay Caspian Kang, author of The Loneliest Americans

• What a wonder this book is! Paoletta’s curiosity and learning run deep as the Vishnu schist, while his empathy and understanding extend out to the far horizon. Paoletta’s deep thinking about the American West—across red mesas, scant waters and improbable cities—is as essential as it is companionable.

  — Rivka Galchen, author of Everyone Knows Your Mother is a Witch