Last weekend, after our French Basin trail walk, we stopped at Mare Gold bookstore in Annapolis Royal (see also An Author’s Market). It is a real treasure. Heather found a book on botanical illustration. I saw a couple of interesting titles but decided to hold off. Why?
a) do we really need more books?
b) managing two houses is a financial burden.
Later, I went online and researched Mike Duggan, Kings College, London.
The end result was that we returned to Mare Gold on Wednesday. I picked up two books.
Mike Duggan’s, All Mapped Out: How maps shape us.
and John Muir’s “The Story of my boyhood and youth: a memoir”.
The second was for Heather.
From the back cover of Muir.
Robert MacFarlane. “No other writer is so ceaselessly astonished by the natural world as Muir, or communicates that astonishment more urgently.”
From the back cover of Duggan:
“Mike Duggan asks questions of our present reliance on digital mapping: how the technologies subtly pervade our lives, condition our consumption habits and even shape our experience of the world,” Veronica Della Dora, Professor of Human Geography, University of London.
For myself, it is a marvel that I can discover these books so close to home (Middleton to Annapolis Royal). Given my interests in ‘all things geographic’, I struggle with the impact of technology: GPS, and Google Maps. Duggan helps to put it in perspective. He also introduces me to happenings on the other side of the Atlantic, and authors like Phil Cohen, and Livingmaps Network.
Both Edward, and myself, appreciate and enjoy this perspective on our world. Do pay a visit to Mare Gold. They offer a unique resource in the region.
REFERENCES
Mike Duggan, 2024, All Mapped Out: How maps shape us, Reaktion Books (U Chicago Press distributor)
John Muir, (orig. 1913) The Story of my boyhood and youth: A Memoir, U Wisconsin Press
Ernest Blair Experiment 