Description: Organizing his book according to the monastic hours of prayer, Chet Raymo examines the strength of scientific language to encounter the divine in the natural world.
Brief description: For nearly forty years, Chet Raymo has been exploring the relationship between science, nature, and the humanities as a professor, writer, illustrator and naturalist. In The Path: A One-Mile Walk Through the Universe, he uses the one-mile path he has walked to work for the past four decades as a means of discovering the extraordinary in everyday life. A professor emeritus of astronomy and physics at Stonehill College in North Easton, Massachusetts, Raymo is the noted author of more than eight books on science, including the highly-praised An Intimate Look at the Night Sky, 365 Starry Nights, The Soul of the Night, Honey from Stone, and Skeptics and True Believers. In 1998, he won a prestigious Lannan Literary Award for the body of his non-fiction work. Raymo is also the author of two novels, In the Falcon's Claw (1990) and The Dork of Cork (1993), which has been sold in twelve languages. Since 1985, he has written "Science Musings" for the Boston Globe, a weekly science and nature column reflecting upon the human side of science. He is also a frequent contributor to popular science and nature publications. Chet Raymo and his wife Maureen live in North Easton, Massachusetts.
Review Quotes:
"Chet Raymo, bless him, is one of those enchanting polymaths who are in love with the universe and use the language of science to make up the words for their love songs. So struck is he by the animated magnificence of clouds, hills, oceans, islands and the light in the sky that he makes geology, physics and astronomy into life sciences and then sings in the language of these life sciences to life itself." --The Boston Globe
"Master taleteller, deft and graceful scientist, passionate poet, Raymo is a storycatcher and storysinger of rare humor, hawkness of eye, breadth of biology and physics acumen, and lyricism of line. Trust me when I say that swimming in his stories is elevating, edifying, and exuberant-making." --Brian Doyle, author of Spirited Men and Epiphanies & Elegies "Lovely essays brimming with mysticism." --Kirkus Reviews "A reverie, an entrancing meditation, on stones and stars and mossy ruins . . . Raymo has somehow found a way to invoke magic, without requiring me to believe in it." --San Francisco Chronicle "A beautiful series of essays that examine science, religion, and the landscape of Kerry. . . . A travel book about the world of ideas." --Irish Echo "Chet Raymo is simply the best literary naturalist writing today, producing elegantly written, insightful books that open from a seemingly modest premise into a dizzying (and sometimes humbling) view of our place in the universe. . . . He is our apostle of the joy of curiosity." --Bookpage