Reviews

"Wallach insightfully examines the tension...created by the desire of bettering our lives--progress--versus our abhorrence at battering the land in its pursuit. And the tension is resolved, or rather rationalized, through three disguises: the disguise of efficiency, of social welfare, and of ecology. Into this original typology he fits the successes and failures of the conservation movement, be they the creation of the national forests or the depletion of the Ogallala aquifer, and with doses of Dillard-like naturalism, he has cut a conservationist gem that soberly contrasts with the eco-alarmism that is so much the fashion in this genre." --Gilbert Taylor, Booklist"Wallach's style makes reading his book enjoyable, deceptively so until one realizes the enormous amount of information the book contains, all of it interesting and reliable, much of it new." --Duncan Howlett, Forest & Conservation History"A delightful, provocative, and, ultimately, a deeply disturbing book." --Agricultural History"A remarkable book. . . . Wallach offers a calm, measured and highly readable account of landscape and the people who made it, set against debates about the development over time of the politics of land-use planning. . . . If more geographers wrote like this the subject would blossom." --Progress in Human Geography