They Left One Tree

HONORABLE MENTION: THE 2022 PRISM PRIZE FOR CLIMATE LITERATURE THE JOURNEY OF A LIFETIME. THE GAMBLE OF A LIFE. Five hundred years from now, Earth’s three billion citizens look up to their solar system after centuries of retreating from every environment on the planet. A hushed-up discovery, too impossible to believe, but too important to ignore, sends astrobiology professor Jack Wilson away from his home in Chicago. Alone, he undertakes a quiet journey through a landscape almost nobody has stepped in for centuries: the interior of North America. Success could rewrite history—the world’s, and his family’s. Failure risks the lives of his friends, including one he hasn’t seen for a decade.