Lost woods

Here is a trove of Carson writing never before published or collected, uncovered by Linda Lear, author of the recent and acclaimed Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature.

Included are examples of her early and often remarkable nature writing for newspapers and for the Fish and Wildlife Service; journal observations on shore life; letters, including the "Lost Woods" correspondence concerning her efforts to save land in her beloved Maine, and another, written to her physician near the end of her life, that reveals Carson's fight to be told the truth about her cancer even as she was working to expose the hazards of pesticides. Lost Woods also creates a vivid record of Carson's activism.

In talks to national groups, she gives astute early criticism of the ties between universities and chemical manufacturers, and skewers her critics with still-timely precision.