Title: Open Midnight: Where Ancestors and Wilderness Meet
Author: Brooke Williams
Trinity University Press, 2017. 232 pages.
15 Bytes Book Award for Nonfiction
2017 AML Creative Non-Fiction Award finalist
Reviewed by Steven L. Peck, Oct. 13, 2018
If the universe had appeared to me (in some suitable form to make me comfortable) and said, “Steve, I’m really feeling the need to make a book for you to enjoy. What would you like in it?”
I would have thought very hard for a while. Maybe a few days, then I would have said,
“So Universe, here is the book I would like you to provide. First, make it about my favorite area, you know, around Moab, where I’ve spend so much of my life wandering. And send me a good guide, not some visitor. I want the book from a perspective of someone who knows the land, its life, and environs. Someone who has lived among the red sandstones and whose heart beats with the rhythms of the Canyonlands. Got that?”
The universe would nod smiling, “I think I know someone who fits the bill. What else?”
Well, Universe I would say, who is one of my favorite people in the universe?”
The Universe would smile knowingly, “Haha, you’re saying put Darwin in it.”
“If you are writing a perfect book for me, would it be perfect if Darwin was left out?”
“Point taken.”
“Next make it imaginative. You know, a mix of fiction and fact. Maybe an imagined interaction with someone from the past to bring perspective and meaning to what’s going on in the world today.”
“Got it.”
“Lastly make it scientifically literate, make the writing beautiful, make the stories meaningful, and show the world why the Canyonlands and Great Basin matter, make every chapter a delight, let it wander far and wide in those lands. Make everyone want to keep and persevere these lands. Show them their worth, you know?”
The Universe leans back and says, “That’s a tall order.”
I nod. Then thinking maybe I could offer the universe a small challenge, just to test its limits, I add, “So could you also add some meditations drawing from my favorite painting in the ‘Musee d’Orsay.’
The Universe laughs, “Is that all?”
Wow, it did it. It made a perfect book for me, Brooke Williams’, Open Midnight: Where Ancestors and Wilderness Meet.
Seriously folks. Read this book. The Universe did a great job in creating Brooke Williams to create this work (I’m somehow feeling this book wasn’t made just for me. In fact, it may have been made for everyone). It’s wonderful in every way. It’s no wonder it won, 15 Bytes Book Award for Nonfiction.