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Utter, Earth: Advice on Living in a More-than-Human World
Part nature guide, part self-help column, and all love letter to the more-than-human world, Utter, Earth is an exercise in wonder. For animal lovers and readers of Brian Doyle, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Amy Leach.
A light, literary take on an animal book for grown-ups, a tongue-in-cheek self-help column with lessons drawn from nature, a sort of hitchhiker’s guide to the more-than-human world—Isaac Yuen’s Utter, Earth is a celebration, through wordplay and earthplay, of our planet’s riotous wonders.
In a time of dirges and elegies for the natural world, Utter, Earth features odes to sloths, tributes to trilobites, and ringing endorsements for lichen. For animal lovers and readers of Brian Doyle, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Amy Leach, each essay of this one-of-a-kind collection combines joyous language, whimsical tangents, and scientific findings to remind us of and reconnect us with those to whom we are inextricably bound. Highlighting life that once was, still is, and all that we stand to lose, this living and lively mini encyclopedia (complete with glossary) shines the spotlight on the motley, fantastical, and astonishing denizens with whom we share this planet.
A light, literary take on an animal book for grown-ups, a tongue-in-cheek self-help column with lessons drawn from nature, a sort of hitchhiker’s guide to the more-than-human world—Isaac Yuen’s Utter, Earth is a celebration, through wordplay and earthplay, of our planet’s riotous wonders.
In a time of dirges and elegies for the natural world, Utter, Earth features odes to sloths, tributes to trilobites, and ringing endorsements for lichen. For animal lovers and readers of Brian Doyle, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Amy Leach, each essay of this one-of-a-kind collection combines joyous language, whimsical tangents, and scientific findings to remind us of and reconnect us with those to whom we are inextricably bound. Highlighting life that once was, still is, and all that we stand to lose, this living and lively mini encyclopedia (complete with glossary) shines the spotlight on the motley, fantastical, and astonishing denizens with whom we share this planet.
240 pages, Paperback
Published April 1, 2024
1 person is currently reading
71 people want to read
About the author
Isaac Yuen
4 books37 followersIsaac is the co-author of The Sound Atlas: A Guide to Strange Sounds across Landscapes and Imagination, along with Michaela Vieser and published by Reaktion Books. His debut solo nature essay collection, Utter, Earth: Advice on Living in a More-Than-Human World, was published with West Virginia University Press in 2024.
Isaac’s essays and short stories have been published at AGNI, Gulf Coast, Newfound, Orion, Pleiades, PRISM International, Shenandoah, The Willowherb Review, Tin House online, and elsewhere. He has attended writing residencies in Switzerland, Germany, and France. He can be found on his website at www.ekostories.com.
Isaac’s essays and short stories have been published at AGNI, Gulf Coast, Newfound, Orion, Pleiades, PRISM International, Shenandoah, The Willowherb Review, Tin House online, and elsewhere. He has attended writing residencies in Switzerland, Germany, and France. He can be found on his website at www.ekostories.com.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
September 17, 2024
If you are anything like me and have grown up (or allegedly grown up that is), with David Attenborough’s marvellous and sometimes magical documentaries on the world we live in, then you will probably be fascinated by the natural world like me. There are hundreds of books out there on nature and they vary from detailed academic tomes to books that tell a more personal story and how people have discovered how nature is a crutch that they have come to rely on.
And then there is this book, Utter, Earth.
It is unlike any other natural history book that I have ever read. It is a series of tongue-in-cheek essays about all manner of subjects from the naming of your progeny, to what happens when you rub a freshly plucked parrot with a poison frog, what the difference is between shoals and schools and which beetle can survive being run over. I particularly liked the final section of the book where Yuen expands his thoughts on all sorts of living creatures.
I really enjoyed the wired and strangely engaging read on the natural world. It is full of wry and humorous observations on the quirks and wonders on this planet we are on. Reading this is a easy way to collect the weird and wonderful facts that you can drop into conversations when people are least expecting it! It’s a great book.
And then there is this book, Utter, Earth.
It is unlike any other natural history book that I have ever read. It is a series of tongue-in-cheek essays about all manner of subjects from the naming of your progeny, to what happens when you rub a freshly plucked parrot with a poison frog, what the difference is between shoals and schools and which beetle can survive being run over. I particularly liked the final section of the book where Yuen expands his thoughts on all sorts of living creatures.
I really enjoyed the wired and strangely engaging read on the natural world. It is full of wry and humorous observations on the quirks and wonders on this planet we are on. Reading this is a easy way to collect the weird and wonderful facts that you can drop into conversations when people are least expecting it! It’s a great book.
May 26, 2024
Recommended for a book club reading! With no expectations that I started and I finished it with a big smile, satisfaction and lots of emotions. What a wordcraft Isaac Yuen is. Book is very poetic and full of fun. Lots wisdom! It opened my eyes to parallel universes of the plants and the animals that we share of this wonderful planet called earth! I am sure, I will pick it up for another read later. Highly recommend it.
October 30, 2024
This book is delightfully weird, and as I grow even more pessimistic about the STEM-ification and worship of tech fuckery in education, this writer reminds me of the humor and grace of science writing that I adore from time to time. There's poetry in observing the truly bizarre in Nature and language.
My favorite was the Brief Thoughts on Almost Every Mentioned, Mostly Living Thing (in Alphabetical Order). Here's a few that made me laugh:
Beef tapeworm: Live abroad. See the world. Settle down in the cozy host and raise 100,000 offspring. Can't fault its life philosophy.
Bono's Joshua Tree trapdoor spider: Rushes out of its burrow to inject its prey with venom. Unclear if entomologist Jason Bond U2 fan or hater.
Geoduck: Eventually grows too big to fit back into its shell. What an awkward day that must have been.
Shire horse: Must look even more giant to hobbits, who are so used to ponies.
My favorite was the Brief Thoughts on Almost Every Mentioned, Mostly Living Thing (in Alphabetical Order). Here's a few that made me laugh:
Beef tapeworm: Live abroad. See the world. Settle down in the cozy host and raise 100,000 offspring. Can't fault its life philosophy.
Bono's Joshua Tree trapdoor spider: Rushes out of its burrow to inject its prey with venom. Unclear if entomologist Jason Bond U2 fan or hater.
Geoduck: Eventually grows too big to fit back into its shell. What an awkward day that must have been.
Shire horse: Must look even more giant to hobbits, who are so used to ponies.
December 7, 2024
Real Rating: 4.5* of five
The Publisher Says: A light, literary take on an animal book for grown-ups, a tongue-in-cheek self-help column with lessons drawn from nature, a sort of hitchhiker’s guide to the more-than-human world—Isaac Yuen’s Utter, Earth is a celebration, through wordplay and earthplay, of our planet’s riotous wonders.
In a time of dirges and elegies for the natural world, Utter, Earth features odes to sloths, tributes to trilobites, and ringing endorsements for lichen. For animal lovers and readers of Brian Doyle, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Amy Leach, each essay of this one-of-a-kind collection combines joyous language, whimsical tangents, and scientific findings to remind us of and reconnect us with those to whom we are inextricably bound. Highlighting life that once was, still is, and all that we stand to lose, this living and lively mini encyclopedia (complete with glossary) shines the spotlight on the motley, fantastical, and astonishing denizens with whom we share this planet.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: Wry, amusing essays on life, the Universe, and everything. I'm not sure I'd've picked this book up if it hadn't been for David Naimon (podcast Between the Covers host) delivering this encomium:
Like any collection of essays, some work better for individual reader than others. My own favorites were:
I was charmed and amused and educated by these pieces of Author Yuen's brain. I'm pretty sure I could summarize the contents of the essays, but I'm also sure that constitutes a spoiler. And having run afoul of the shrill shrieks of the Spoiler Stasi before, I ain't a-doin' that. Read 'em your damnself.
I'll give you these, because if you want to yell at someone, you can yell at the press's marketing folk for including them:
There. I've done what I can to entice you into getting and enhoying this condensed, enriched, fortified collection of an intelligent man's musings on words, ideas, and the way they interact to form the world. Even the odd, off-kilter title of the collection makes perfect sense after reading the entire book. (I suspect that, like me, a lot of y'all might be put off by it...please ignore that urge and try this one out!)
Get two. You'll want one, and it's Yuletide so gifting one to someone who loves nature, language, and humor, is only decent.
The Publisher Says: A light, literary take on an animal book for grown-ups, a tongue-in-cheek self-help column with lessons drawn from nature, a sort of hitchhiker’s guide to the more-than-human world—Isaac Yuen’s Utter, Earth is a celebration, through wordplay and earthplay, of our planet’s riotous wonders.
In a time of dirges and elegies for the natural world, Utter, Earth features odes to sloths, tributes to trilobites, and ringing endorsements for lichen. For animal lovers and readers of Brian Doyle, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Amy Leach, each essay of this one-of-a-kind collection combines joyous language, whimsical tangents, and scientific findings to remind us of and reconnect us with those to whom we are inextricably bound. Highlighting life that once was, still is, and all that we stand to lose, this living and lively mini encyclopedia (complete with glossary) shines the spotlight on the motley, fantastical, and astonishing denizens with whom we share this planet.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: Wry, amusing essays on life, the Universe, and everything. I'm not sure I'd've picked this book up if it hadn't been for David Naimon (podcast Between the Covers host) delivering this encomium:
“To shoal is to be social, to sense together, we learn in one of Yuen’s more-than-human essays. But to school is to sweep together in unison, to dazzle with coherence. It’s this spirit of schooling that animates Utter, Earth, essays that—in their curiosity, play, and care—aim to weave us back into a world of which we are but one small part. How would our language change if we invited nonhuman others alongside us again in fellowship, if our lives not only allowed for but celebrated everything swimming just beyond the limits of what we know? It’s not time for school, it’s time to school, to school with the creatures of Utter, Earth, the lemurs, leopards, and leafcutter ants, the wombats, waterbuck, and wildebeest, to school with others to find ourselves again.”
Like any collection of essays, some work better for individual reader than others. My own favorites were:
I was charmed and amused and educated by these pieces of Author Yuen's brain. I'm pretty sure I could summarize the contents of the essays, but I'm also sure that constitutes a spoiler. And having run afoul of the shrill shrieks of the Spoiler Stasi before, I ain't a-doin' that. Read 'em your damnself.
I'll give you these, because if you want to yell at someone, you can yell at the press's marketing folk for including them:
There. I've done what I can to entice you into getting and enhoying this condensed, enriched, fortified collection of an intelligent man's musings on words, ideas, and the way they interact to form the world. Even the odd, off-kilter title of the collection makes perfect sense after reading the entire book. (I suspect that, like me, a lot of y'all might be put off by it...please ignore that urge and try this one out!)
Get two. You'll want one, and it's Yuletide so gifting one to someone who loves nature, language, and humor, is only decent.
October 2, 2025
I’d say “it teaches life lessons from animal kingdom examples,” but I think that’s misleading and would give you the wrong idea about how this book is set up. Instead, imagine various life problems of your own, already solved in various forms and to different degrees across the world (and time)… and you are simply learning about those things. It was meandering and adventurous, and I feel like I learned a lot about the world around me, or at the very least, how to reframe some very important concepts. Quite funny at times!
July 9, 2024
Whimsical, quirky, humorous essays relating human behaviors to those of the vast, astonishing variety of living things in the natural world. I wondered how the author could keep all the species straight, until I read the “Brief Thoughts on Almost Every Mentioned, Mostly Living Thing” at the end and marveled at the author’s affinity and facility. As a sometime nature writer, my favorite essay was the last: “So You Want to Write An Animal Essay.” Wonder-filled.
September 14, 2024
A delightful take on all life forms, packed with factual whimsy. A cheeky must-read for any homo sapien who wants to revel in language and clever insights about living things; one's fellow creatures are fun, funny, and joyful to behold!
(P.S. Charming illustrations are the icing on the cake).
(P.S. Charming illustrations are the icing on the cake).
September 19, 2025
An inventive, curious, smart, and brilliantly playful collection of essays about what our animal friends can teach us. Unlike anything I've read. A wonderful companion and an utter delight.
July 17, 2024
I didn't know what exactly to expect when I started reading this book. It took a bit of adjustment to the intricate language, but once I got the style, oh boy, I could not stop reading! It made me laugh, it made me weep, it made me absolutely fascinated with all the mentioned creatures (500!) and wanting to learn more about them. I loved everything about this book, and I should say it's a must read for anyone who loves animal and our beautiful planet (and a great sense of humor). I'll have to re read the book again, there are so many layers and facts, that it needs extra attention which I will be happy to give!
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews