"With its soaring azure sky and stark landscapes, the American Southwest is one of the most hauntingly beautiful regions on earth. Yet staggering population growth, combined with the intensifying effects of climate change, is driving the oasis-based society close to the brink of a Dust-Bowl-scale catastrophe. In A Great Aridness, William deBuys paints a compelling picture of what the Southwest might look like when the heat turns up and the water...

"Set on the small farm in a New Mexico mountain valley that the author has tended since 1976, the book explores how personal history and natural history interweave in a familiar landscape. Three interrelated essays move from conflict and loss in the author's life to a place of acceptance"--Provided by publisher.