Mark Hertsgaard, The Daily Beast 'Timely and of national interest.

San Francisco Examiner 'Essential background reading for anyone who cares about the drought ravaging the West and the region's prospects for changing course before it is too late.' 'Masterful.Among the most influential environmental books published by an American since Silent Spring.' This edition includes a new postscript by Lawrie Mott, a former staff scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, that updates Western water issues over the last two decades, including the long-term impact of climate change and how the region can prepare for the future. Based on more than a decade of research, Cadillac Desert is a stunning expose and a dramatic, intriguing history of the creation of an Eden-an Eden that may only be a mirage. Army Corps of Engineers, in the competition to transform the West. He documents the bitter rivalry between two government giants, the Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. In his landmark book, Cadillac Desert, Marc Reisner writes of the earliest settlers, lured by the promise of paradise, and of the ruthless tactics employed by Los Angeles politicians and business interests to ensure the city's growth. It is a tale of rivers diverted and dammed, of political corruption and intrigue, of billion-dollar battles over water rights, of ecological and economic disaster. He worried that the West's success with irrigation could be a mirage - that it took water for granted and didn't appreciate the precariousness of our capacity to control it.' - Farhad Manjoo, The New York Times, January 20,2023 'The definitive work on the West's water crisis.' -Newsweek The story of the American West is the story of a relentless quest for a precious resource: water. Photos.īook Synopsis 'I've been thinking a lot about Cadillac Desert in the past few weeks, as the rain fell and fell and kept falling over California, much of which, despite the pouring heavens, seems likely to remain in the grip of a severe drought. Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award. About the Book Newly updated, this timely history of the struggle to discover and control water in the American West is a tale of rivers diverted and damned, political corruption and intrigue, billion-dollar battles over water rights, and economic and ecological disaster.

Cadillac desert book