Through more than a dozen major works, Pyne (Fire: A Brief History) has shown himself to be both a nature writer and a cultural historian of the first order. Using wildfire as the lens through which he focuses on human interactions with the environment, these 32 essays (a successor to his earlier anthology World Fire: The Culture of Fire and Earth) deepen and extend Pyne's long-time interest in how "fire, for humanity, is more than a process: it is a relationship." But here, in a departure from his more lengthy historical narratives, Pyne directs his efforts toward "a more robust literary inquiry," in an attempt "to analyze fire as [he] would an art moderne house, an election campaign, or a rereading of Ulysses." The result is as remarkable as it is varied. Some of the best essays exhibit Pyne's sharp and astute analyses of how different fire-based systems and practices are used by various cultures in Africa, Australia, Mexico and New Zealand, and show how, "as a dialectic between humans and nature, fire regimes express the values, institutions and beliefs of their sustaining societies." Overall, these sharply written essays argue convincingly for Pyne's core belief that "fire practices are, ultimately, a moral matter, relating to who we are and how we should behave." (Mar.)
