Here is a look at an interview that former Calabasas Mayor Karyn Foley did on Tree for her show “Author’s Night:” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUx3twJDisQ&t=530s.
“Far from cute, this book takes a serious look at the value of love, the impossibility of permanence, and the ways in which humans leave the world.” – Kirkus Reviews
Advance Reviews:
“If trees have standing before the law, as many argue, then they might very well also have standing in historical fiction as Melina Sempill Watts demonstrates in this intriguing new novel … Blending environmentalism, magical realism, social history, and arboreal science, Tree challenges … readers to regard the natural world with new respect.”
– Dr. Kevin Starr, premier California historian, winner of a National Humanities medal, the L.A. Times Book Prize, California State Librarian Emeritus and USC professor
“When we talk about environmental literature today, we pretty much mean non-fiction — and there are acres of important books that come out on endangered species, policy, restoration work, science, engineering, sustainability, gardening, environmental justice, memoirs — the list is endless. But when it comes to the literature of the environment, meaning potential candidates for the great American environmental novel, since The Monkey Wrench Gang and Ishmael, our shelves are nearly empty. Tree is a bold new candidate in this category: a dive into the imagined interior realm of plants and the animals and people who love them, into the culture, history and ecosystems of the Santa Monica Mountains. You’ll read it and read it again.”
– Aaron Mair, 2016-2017 Sierra Club President
Book foreword is by Andy Lipkis, Founder, TreePeople.
More Information:
Professors at UCLA and Loyola Marymount in California are currently integrating Tree into their upcoming curriculum. I spoke on a panel at Los Angeles Times Book Festival this spring and have been a featured speaker at such venues as Diesel, A Bookstore in Brentwood, California, at the Merced River Watershed Festival at Riverdance Farms outside Merced, California and at Adventure-16 in San Diego, California.
Here is a look at an interview that former Calabasas Mayor Karyn Foley did on Tree for her show “Author’s Night:” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUx3twJDisQ&t=530s.
