The Everybody Ensemble: Donkeys, Essays, and Other Pandemoniums

by Amy Leach

In short, gloriously inventive essays, Whiting Award-winning author Amy Leach's The Everybody Ensemble invites us to see and celebrate our oddball, interconnected world

Humans, please turn your guns into kazoos.

Are you feeling dismay, despair, disillusion? Need a break from the ho-hum, the hopeless, and the hurtful? Feel certain that there’s a version of our world that doesn’t break down into tiny categories of alliance but brings everybody together into one clattering, sometimes discordant but always welcoming chorus of glorious pandemonium?

Amy Leach, the celebrated author of the transcendent Things That Are , invites you into The Everybody Ensemble , an effervescent tonic of a book. These short, wildly inventive essays are filled with praise songs, poetry, ingenious critique, soul-lifting philosophy, music theory, and whimsical but scientific trips into nature. Here, you will meet platypuses, Tycho Brahe and his moose, barnacle goslings, medieval mystics, photosynthetic bacteria, and a wholly fresh representation of the biblical Job.

Equal parts call to reason and to joy, this book is an irrepressible celebration of our oddball, interconnected world. The Everybody Ensemble delivers unexpected wisdom and a wake-up call that sounds from within. For readers of Ross Gay, Eula Biss, Anne Lamott, Annie Dillard, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and even Lewis Carroll, these twenty-four essays will be a perfect match.

Genres: Essays, Nonfiction, Animals, Humor, Nature, Science

208 pages, Hardcover

First published November 16, 2021

About the author

Amy Leach’s work has been published in A Public Space, Tin House, Orion, the Los Angeles Review, and many others. She has been recognized with the Whiting Writers’ Award, Best American Essays selections, a Rona Jaffe Foundation Award, and a Pushcart Prize. She plays bluegrass, teaches English, and lives in Montana. Things That Are is her first book.

Reviews

[Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I first began this book I thought..what the heck is this for a book? After setting it aside briefly to read another book I came back to it and could not put it down. This is a book made for anyone who enjoys words slung together and crafted in such a way as to make full sense and no sense at the same time. It is wordsmith heaven.
I soon realised that this book is a series of essays and lectures which will "set out some important principles to help you break out of " turnip thinking"".
It is a book of facts and useful information and personal reflections such as: "Plants being stationary, are generally easier to count than animals". " " Geese are more meloncholy than rocks, being indivisible". "I've been up a creek without a tuxedo before, and once I even found myself up a creek with no tuba.". " Being snubbed by walruses --- this is why I read, because some writers are almost as good as walruses for joggling the head, freeing it of relevant concerns." "Blood is blood and everyone is a decanter". "...literature is more like sheep. Never have we burst into flames when we got hit by a sheep".
This book is defintely worth a read and a ponder. It will make you think in a new direction, in ground that you never knew existed. Well written and highly readable; Amy Leach has done a service to literature by creating this great book of essays; humorous, thought provoking and certainly sure to keep you coming back for useful reference.
"aspire to be anchovies--members of a swarm intelligence..."

[Katy Hudak · Rating 2 out of 5]

The fun, quirky, oddball humor became grating pretty quickly

[J Daniels · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just a fantastic genre-bending book about inclusion, acceptance, and pushing against labels. It is not a typical collection of nonfiction essays that spoon feeds you understanding in a mushy pile. If you are looking for a shock and awe expo on abuse or addiction, this is not it. If you want clarity about life, this is going to challenge you to think in new ways, make new associations and grapple with your own pride of how things should be. This collection goes so far into metaphors that global understanding of what it is to be labeled and categorized can be felt by anyone willing to give the short essays time to distill. By crafting essays that refuse labeling, Leach has given one more layer to her meanings behind the collection. Many in my nonfiction class didn't like the playfulness saying it was not nonfiction-those creative leaps should be saved for fiction, but as a fictionist, I say, stop being snobs. Leach has taken a genre so defined by rigid expectations and given the world a new category of nonfiction essays that no longer focus on the author, but rather picks blueberries and zebras to represent ideas and potential. Sure, Brian Doyle talks about shrews and other elements like whale hearts, but I still know it's coming from Brian Doyle. Leach feels removed from the essay in order to invite the reader to become the author, let go of expectations and enjoy the fanciful ride through a zoo where everything has been categorized and labeled to perfection...but leaving the zoo, the little brown bird is just a bird. What Leach is allowing to happen in these moments is reflection for the reader on the classifications we are submerged in and stepping outside, we are free to just (italics) be. Without labels or maps or signs. Just be.
I have read this collection twice now and will likely read it again and again in coming years for the masterfully crafted sentences as well as themes of inclusion and acceptance, grace and mercy, as well as making a place for everyone. Just loved it.

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've said it before. Amy Leach makes this planet seem like a fantasy world, with musings reminiscent of fairy tales, leading us through her wild trains of thought. Leach's mind is populated with a deep attention to nature and a whole lot of whimsical words. I absolutely loved her *Things That Are.* Though her latest essay collection does not grab me as fiercely, I will contend that "Beanstan for Pet" and "Beasts in the Margins" are worth the price of a ticket on Leach's most recent thought train.

[Thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux @fsgbooks and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for my opinion.]

[kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

i enjoyed the whimsy, but didn’t feel like this was for me

[Alisha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this so much. It's playful, silly, and smart and overflows with awe for the natural world.

Maybe next time I'll read it with a dictionary or an encyclopedia at hand.

[Kendalyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been deliberating on how to approach composing an adequate review for this weird book for some weeks. And weird it is. I was sitting in class one day with this book lying on my desk when my professor came up, tapped the cover and said, "That's a good book. It's so weird." It was a positive appraisal and I agree. It is so weird. Amy Leach really covers everything, nothing is out of range for what can be written about. I had the privilege of a zoom call with her in a class of mine, during which we all asked her questions related to the writing process. Near the end, I asked her about her ability to integrate more elevated language and ideas alongside the use of slang/colloquialisms and commonplace things. She beamed, delighted, saying, "I love colloquialisms!" After which she related Peters vision of the unclean animals coming down in a vessel, like a great sheet, in the book of Acts. Peter is put off at first but God tells him that they, too, were meant to be killed and eaten: "What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common." It's a powerful scripture when placed in the context she placed it in. I've always brushed past it. I know better now. Leach, as an essayist, sees the potential for common things and knows they all have a place in the written word and a potential, in a sense, to be cleansed or atleast to step apart from their old, bogged down associations and be placed in a newer light. We can do that, as meaning makers, as creative beings. We can make common things uncommon.
I feel this is all still too inadequate so I'm going to share another great essayists words to describe this book, so thank you Ross Gay:

"If you need to be re-gobsmacked by the un-decodable, undecipherable earth; if you need to be re-flummoxed by this crooked orb's tactile and creaturely miraculous; and if you need the astonished, weird, beautiful yawp of some kin brokeheart but still singing—and I mean singing—well, you’ve found your book. I know I have.”

[Sophie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am very much enjoying this book.
To be honest, your vocabulary needs to be quite diverse to get through this book at a reasonable rate, and by that I mean you might spend more time looking up words than reading it. Nonetheless, the comments on topics such as sustainability, families, growing old, politics, and nature, are as delightful as can be. It feels as playful as a nursery rhyme, yet as mature as a court hearing. As an added bonus, the author seems to be well-versed in biological species, and joyfully ties their qualities into her essays.

[Christie Kaaland · Rating 5 out of 5]

My, my, my... just what is this book? Part philosophy, part wordplay, part ode to nature ~~ all nature but humankind ~~ and packed with literary references, this collection of essays pays homage to ...well, nearly every living thing. With so many brilliant quotable stream-0f-consciousness ramblings. Amy Leach is amazing. Reading this slim collection makes one wish to be able to sit down with her and just listen to her quips and quandries.

[Sarah Lada · Rating 3 out of 5]

For me, there were two ways to read this book. The first was go-with-the-literary-flow, don’t stop at the speed bumps of googleable words (because sometimes a Google search yields nothing), just enjoy the playfulness for as long as you can tolerate or understand it. The second way I read this book was to understand it which led to me rolling my eyes, slamming the book down in frustration, and learning about great events of oxygenation. Sometimes I needed my own great event of oxygenation. I love Leach’s playfulness but sometimes the consonance and alliteration was just simply that, consonance and alliteration. This book explores and celebrates and ponders the distinct and indistinct lines between humans and the more-than-human world. This book sits on the top of a lofty mountain laughing at us feeble humans who name the animals and create the meanings but we wouldn’t have those names and meanings without the more-than-human world. I love this sentiment and I love Leach’s mind. I appreciate this book without loving it, distinctly recalling when I read her line, “…but is is so imaginatively taxing to sit through a performance that never ends.” Sometimes I wanted this book to just be done. Sometimes I wanted it to collapse into itself and become a gem so I can wear it around my neck. I loved “Things That Are” much more but appreciate the research and imagination of these essays.

[Hilary "Fox" · Rating 2 out of 5]

Amy Leach has written an interesting book that I have a lot of trouble trying to categorize. It is part essay collection, part kind of... poetry collection? It's humor, but it is also beautiful and deathly serious. It's earnest, but quirky. It just is sort of... there. Pandemoniums isn't a bad designation for it.

I'm torn about how to rate it or describe it. There were portions of it that really spoke to me - the Robert Bruce of vines and the resilience of the hedgehog for two examples. Other things just fell rather flat and left me raising an eyebrow and turning the page. It's a quick read, at least. A baffling and quick read.

I think ultimately the book just came off as a bit too twee for me. I felt the essays were unfocused. If they'd lingered more on particular species of flora or fauna rather than jumping around it would have resonated a bit more strongly with me and left me feeling a bit more. As it was, I just kind of tilted my head as I read, buffeted by too many facts and a whirlwind of whims rather than learning anything that I felt was truly magical.

A very good idea, the execution just wasn't quite there for me.

[James B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks to Netgalley and FSG for the early ebook. This is a book of heady, fun-filled essays that spans the ages with a loving eye on all the planet’s animals, big and small, on land or sea. The opening essay is a grand imagining of all the Earth’s creatures coming together and all of them singing at the same time. The author shows off her never ending love and extensive knowledge of animals (and classical music, which comes up again and again). My main surprise was how playful these essays are, never missing a chance to tell her stories with humor, both high and low. This slim book is an excellent introduction to a writer with big ideas that always lovingly invite you instead of holding you off with a cold hand.

[Kristy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I will admit that 2 stars is possibly not a fair rating for the quality of writing and uniqueness of this book. However, I just didn't enjoy it.
I think perhaps if I had not read the essays all at once, but had instead spaced them out over time with other reading I may have found them less irritating.
There were certainly some that I enjoyed very much, but I got tired very quickly of the quirky style of writing. In the end, there were few that I really liked. (In part because I was just over the whole collection.)
I think I'll pass on this author in the future. She is someone's cup of tea, but not mine.

[Nat · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Seventy pounds of antler seems like an affirmation somehow, an exaggerated weight attaching the moose implacably to the Earth, saying, Yes without a question, yes with all my heart. Yes if it pitches me face-first into the mud, yes if the rest of me withers, yes if my yes gets splintered, or broken, or deformed: yes and yes and yes again. When you have wings, your hope can be elsewhere—up in the sky. But wings of solid bone scorn the idea of flight: your hope must be here."

[Nathan Hubbard · Rating 4 out of 5]

A 3-star book written with 5-star love, so take the average. Every sentence is exquisite and excessive and intentionally carelessly crafted, with references and vocabulary words galore, like "Absent thee and absent me, the world would return to serenity, to the longueurs of perfection, and there would just be the bacteria and the popes left." The problem is that when every sentence is like that, they all lose their impact.

[Fiona · Rating 4 out of 5]

An absurd and quirky collection, definitely evoking the more far flung reaches of the imagination. It’s heavily centered around animals and an existence on Earth, with funny quips and memorable lines. Very good, excited for it to come out for retail.

[Ginny · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Everybody Ensemble delivered the perfect balance of making me think and making me laugh. In fact, I was laughing so hard, the neighbor who shares our living room wall must think my life just got a whole lot more entertaining...and you know, what? It did!

[Arabella · Rating 4 out of 5]

This odd little collection of stories - or are they essays? - either way, they're weird and absolutely delightful. They say a lot if you listen closely, but in the most charming way possible, with animals.

[Lizz · Rating 2 out of 5]

For the most part, I did not "get" this book. Some of the essays felt thoroughly removed from any meaning whatsoever. Others, though, were fun and snappy and thoughtful, all at once. I liked "Beanstan for Pet" and "The Catastrophe" best.

[Gail Kennon · Rating 5 out of 5]

joyous and lingusitically playful run down on the general state of the universe. the words dance and sing on the page and while the story of how we're taking care of the earth is often not a happy one reading this helps encourage me.

[Josh Laws · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fun little essay book full of word play and whimsy. Mostly focused on nature and the animal kingdom the author has a lot of fun playing with your expectations. I wasn't blown away by it but I definitely enjoyed it.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

You will sworp and bugle in delight at this book’s witty, subversive, lyric wisdom.

[S · Rating 4 out of 5]

A completely unique, whimsical book that has a ball with language... but also makes you think. It made me laugh and cry. Not everyone will "get" this book, but those who do will like it a lot.

[Sarah Ingala · Rating 3 out of 5]

While Leach is a very creative and talented writer, these essays vacillated between interesting thoughts and nonsensical ramblings a bit too much.

[Alicia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book gave me the following wonderful words: pessimop and optimess

[sara-emilie · Rating 3 out of 5]

good alliteration, occasional wisdom

[BLDinMT · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were a couple of essays in this collection that were very good, but overall...I just didn't "get" it.

[Loriepaddock · Rating 4 out of 5]

I laughed and learned. A solid reading experience.

[Cathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75⭐️

[Marybeth Farris · Rating 4 out of 5]

More quirky hilarious writing!