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WORK TITLE: A Hole in the Wind
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https://thehumanist.com/contributor/david-goodrich/ * http://pegasusbooks.com/books/a-hole-in-the-wind-9781681774312-hardcover * http://pegasusbooks.com/authors/david-goodrich
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PERSONAL
Male.
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CAREER
Writer. Worked previously at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), as director of the United Nations Global Climate Observing System, and as head of NOAA’s Climate Observations and Monitoring Program. Retired from NOAA 2011.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
David Goodrich is a writer and climate scientist. He worked previously with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and served as the Director of the United Nations Global Climate Observing System in Geneva, Switzerland. Before retiring, he worked as the head of NOAA’s Climate Observations and Monitoring Program.
Following retirement, Goodrich embarked upon a cross-country road trip from Delaware to Oregon. During this time, he spoke with Americans, from scientists to children, about environmental issues. The cross-country trip and the conversations he had while on it inspired him to write a book about the complicated relationship between climate change and human acceptance of mankind’s impact on the natural world. Goodrich lives in Maryland.
A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist’s Bicycle Journey Across the United States, Goodrich’s first book, documents his United States cross-country bicycle trip. Starting in Delaware, Goodrich set off on the 4,200-mile ride in 2011 after retiring from a long career as a climate scientist.
The purpose of Goodrich’s trip was a pursuit of both pleasure and investigation. He set out with the intention of learning about how his life’s work has been received by citizens in the United States. While Goodrich’s cycling journey moves the narrative forward, the main focus of the story is the people he meets along the way and the attitudes about climate change with which he is confronted.
A contributor to Publishers Weekly noted that Goodrich’s “most interesting observation is that small-town America has its head in the sand regarding climate change.” Cycling primarily through middle America, Goodrich interacts with scientists, schoolchildren, and everyday Americans. Through these conversations, Goodrich encounters significant climate change denial among American citizens, despite science suggesting the reality of climate change.
He quickly discovers that climate change is a taboo topic of discussion. When he inquires about sea level rise to a volunteer at Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge on the Delaware coast, the volunteer responds with a vague answer casting doubt on sea level rise, and emphasizing instead the unfortunate rise of flood insurance costs. Goodrich finds time and time again that the individuals with whom he speaks are more interested in discussing the make of his bicycle than talking about the reason for his trip.
As Goodrich travels across the country, he provides a combination of “personal reflections with sobering environmental facts,” wrote a contributor to Booklist. He pairs his observations with examinations into the root causes of the climate change denial trend, including political influences that provide misinformation and falsehoods about the history of climate change science. He relates the ways in which narrative and tone regarding climate change have influenced public opinion about the topic, and how this narrative has been presented to the public over the years.
Nature is not just a theoretical presence in the book. As Goodrich cycles through the states, he repeatedly finds himself at the mercy of weather extremes. He writes about torrential rains in Maryland, debilitating heat in Kansas, and wild storms on the highways of Wyoming. Alan Fallow, writing in Inquirer, noted that Goodrich’s confrontations with nature’s extremes “crystallizes his larger message: We live at the mercy of the elements—a dependency that should motivate us to combat climate change.”
The book is peppered with anecdotes about Goodrich’s experiences with the people he meets and the cities he inhabits. A contributor to Kirkus Reviews wrote that Goodrich’s descriptions of “the many dangers he faced during his journey were offset by the hospitality he discovered.” While the facts that Goodrich presents are sobering, the tone of the book is lightened by his accounts of the kindness he met along the way.
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, May 15, 2017, Carl Hays, review of A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist’s Bicycle Journey Across the United States, p. 3.
Kirkus Reviews, May 15, 2017, review of A Hole in the Wind.
Publishers Weekly, April 24, 2017, review of A Hole in the Wind, p. 82.
ONLINE
Washington Post Online, https://www.washingtonpost.com/ (July 4, 2017), Alan Fallow, review of A Hole in The Wind.*
David Goodrich - A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist's Bicycle Journey Across the United States
Sunday, June 25, 2017 at 5 p.m.
Goodrich, former Director of the United Nations Global Climate Observing System in Geneva, retired as head of NOAA's Climate Observations and Monitoring Program. But his work was not finished. Puzzled by Americans’ dismissive attitudes to climate change, he set off on a cross-country bicycle trip to try to understand and rectify the denial. Over the course of 4,200 miles, from Delaware to Oregon, Goodrich discussed environmental issues with everyone from schoolchildren to scientists to ordinary citizens. If he left people more informed about climate change, he also came away enlightened himself, discovering why the issue is so complicated for many of us.
David Goodrich
David Goodrich worked at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and served as the Director of the UN Global Climate Observing System in Geneva, Switzerland. He retired as head of NOAA's Climate Observations and Monitoring Program. In addition to his cross-country bicycle trip, he has ridden down the Appalachians and across Montana, South Dakota, France and Spain. He lives in Maryland.
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Print Marked Items
A Hole in the Wind: A Climate
Scientist's Bicycle Journey Across the
United States
Publishers Weekly.
264.17 (Apr. 24, 2017): p82.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist's Bicycle Journey Across the United States
David Goodrich. Pegasus, $27.95 (304p)
ISBN 978-1-68177-431-2
In 2011, Goodrich, retired head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's
Climate Observation and Monitoring Program, traded his office chair for a bike seat and set off
cross-country seeking a more personal look at the questions that occupied his science career:
whether climate change is manmade and what can be done about it. He quotes Jane Goodall:
"The only way I've found to change people's minds is to tell them stories." His cycle tales--
gleaned from pedaling over 4,500 miles through gas-drilling Pennsylvania, tornado-prone
Missouri, drought-ridden Kansas, and wildfire-choked Montana--aim to convince people that the
planet is in danger. But Goodrich finds that it's a hard sell in many places. He peppers his
narrative with historical anecdotes, environmental science asides, and lots of travel details. The
result is quaint but not earthshaking. Too often, the chapters read like a travelogue of where he
ate and slept. His most interesting observation is that small-town America has its head in the
sand regarding climate change. Across the country he discovers that "you could talk about the
weather, but not the climate." Had Goodrich pumped his subject as willfully as his pedals, this
may have become a more meaningful book. Maps & photos. Agent: John Silbersack, Trident
Media. (June)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist's Bicycle Journey Across the United States."
Publishers Weekly, 24 Apr. 2017, p. 82. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A491250864/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=3255aa2d. Accessed 25 Dec. 2017.
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A Hole in the Wind: A Climate
Scientist's Bicycle Journey across the
United States
Carl Hays
Booklist.
113.18 (May 15, 2017): p3.
COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
Full Text:
A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist's Bicycle Journey across the United States. By David
Goodrich. June 2017. 272p. illus. Pegasus, $27.95 (9781681774312). 551.6.
After decades of working for such esteemed organizations as the UN Global Climate Observing
System in Geneva, climate scientist Goodrich celebrated his retirement by cycling 4,200 miles
from Delaware to Oregon on a mission to spread the word about the looming perils of global
warming. Combining personal reflections with sobering environmental facts and figures he takes
along with him, he exposes a pervasive streak of climate change denial in the U.S. and shares the
best antidotes for politically motivated misinformation. With his wife connecting with him at
key points, he follows a relatively straight line through landmarks like Annapolis and the
Badlands to his final destination, Waldport, Oregon, on the Pacific Ocean. Along the way, he
braves torrential rains in Maryland, exhausting heat in Kansas, and a tornado near-miss in
Missouri, and makes pit stops in laboratories, truck stops, and grade schools to discuss climate
science. Entertaining and instructive, Goodrich's travelogue showcases one man's heroic efforts
to confront this century's greatest environmental crisis.--Carl Hays
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Hays, Carl. "A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist's Bicycle Journey across the United
States." Booklist, 15 May 2017, p. 3. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A496084668/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=906206d8. Accessed 25 Dec. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A496084668
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Goodrich, David: A HOLE IN THE
WIND
Kirkus Reviews.
(May 15, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Goodrich, David A HOLE IN THE WIND Pegasus (Adult Nonfiction) $27.95 6, 6 ISBN: 978-1-
68177-431-2
Climate scientist Goodrich chronicles his cycling journey across the United States.Throughout
his travels, the author compared how people are experiencing, and discussing, changes in the
weather with what he has learned about climate change during his scientific career. Goodrich
was director of the U.N. Global Climate Observing System in Geneva and also served as the
head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Observations and
Monitoring Program. Beginning in Delaware, the author cycled 4,200 miles around the country,
and his narrative serves as a unique profile of the U.S. and its people. He writes of particular
cases in which, season to season--and even day to day--changes in the weather indicate longerterm
consequences for the overall climate. His conversations with fellow scientists and others--
e.g., Annie Larsen, a biologist at Delaware's Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge--give
fascinating insight into how the process is perceived. Though the details differ with topographic
and climatological zones, the overall problems remain the same, whether it's the growing dead
zone at the bottom of the Chesapeake Bay, bigger, more dangerous tornadoes in the Midwest
(which the author encountered), pine beetle infestation in the Rockies, or the shrinking winter
snow pack in the Bitterroot Mountains. Throughout the narrative, Goodrich smoothly
interweaves the stories of the people he met and the places he visited, and he is clear about how
the many dangers he faced during his journey were offset by the hospitality he discovered.
Native American history provides a further dimension to the story, and the author also provides
helpful explanations of how climate scientists work and develop their data. This cyclist's view of
how things really are effectively cuts across head-butting arguments about global warming. A
compelling narrative enlivened as much by the author's encounters on the road as by his skillful
unfolding of scientific knowledge.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Goodrich, David: A HOLE IN THE WIND." Kirkus Reviews, 15 May 2017. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A491934177/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=f8f8e298. Accessed 25 Dec. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A491934177
Entertainment
David Goodrich's 'Hole in the Wind': Bicycling through climate change and denial
Updated: JULY 30, 2017 — 3:01 AM EDT
4
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A Hole in the Wind
A Climate Scientist's Bicycle Journey Across the United States
By David Goodrich
20170730_inq_bk1hole30-a
Pegasus. 249 pp. $27.95
Reviewed by
Alan Fallow
Climate scientist David Goodrich was riding his Trek 520 touring bike along a desolate stretch of Wyoming's Highway 287 when a storm boiled up from the west, catching him out in the open. "I was rapidly folded up in darkness, gusting winds, and lightning flashes," he writes in A Hole in the Wind, a detail-rich chronicle of the half-dozen epic bike rides he has done since 2000, including a 2011 cross-country trip. "There was nothing to do but ball up low on the side of the road, away from the metal bike, and get drenched. I comforted myself that the steel roadside reflectors were a little higher than me." Goodrich makes no allegorical hay of the incident, but it crystallizes his larger message: We live at the mercy of the elements - a dependency that should motivate us to combat climate change.
Goodrich is a good enough reporter - and a sufficiently gifted stylist - to make the miles fly by. And he must have propitiated the cycling gods, for he suffered only one flat tire the entire ride.
Denial seems to be washing in on the tide up and down the Eastern Seaboard. Goodrich shows how climate change - a fact endorsed by 97 percent of climate scientists - has been polemicized by documentaries such as The Great Global Warming Swindle and screeds such as The Greatest Hoax: How the Global Warming Conspiracy Threatens Your Future (penned by a certain Oklahoma senator). You can talk about the weather, he concludes, but not the climate.
So how do you avoid boring readers when narrating a lengthy bike trip with a lofty purpose? You can leaven your text with the occasional harrowing run-in - a pack of vicious dogs in Missouri, say, or railroad tracks that toss you over the handlebars in Kansas - but ultimately you must persuade readers they could tag along and enjoy your company.
Goodrich does just that, whether it's detailing his mythic quest for the perfect college-town coffee shop ("Strange music must fill the air, with lots of people talking intently") or describing a camping adventure that inadvertently flaunts his range as poet-scientist-humorist: "That night in Montana's fire-ravaged Boulder Valley, wind blew the smoke away and the sky exploded in stars. The earth turned toward Sagittarius and the center of the galaxy, the brightest part of the Milky Way. I fell asleep listening to coyotes in the draw."
Next morning, he awakes to the sound of water. A dog is relieving itself on his tent.
Fallow is a freelance writer and book editor in Alexandria, Va. This review originally appeared in the Washington Post.
Opinions
What climate change looks like, from the seat of a bike
Climate scientist David Goodrich encountered violent storms and a changing landscape — as well as skepticism of global warming — on a 4,200-mile bike ride across the United States. (Lukasz Ogrodowczyk/EPA/EPA)
By Allan Fallow July 14
Allan Fallow is a freelance writer and book editor in Alexandria, Va.
Climate scientist David Goodrich was riding his fully loaded Trek 520 touring bike along a desolate stretch of Wyoming’s Highway 287 when a storm boiled up from the west, catching him out in the open. “I was rapidly folded up in darkness, gusting winds, and lightning flashes,” he writes in his memoir “A Hole in the Wind,” a detail-rich chronicle of the half-dozen epic bike rides he has undertaken since 2000, including a 2011 cross-country trip. “There was nothing to do but ball up low on the side of the road, away from the metal bike, and get drenched. I comforted myself that the steel roadside reflectors were a little higher than me.”
Though Goodrich makes no allegorical hay of the incident, it perfectly crystallizes his larger message: We live at the mercy of the elements — a dependency that should be motivation aplenty to combat climate change.
“A Hole in the Wind,” by David Goodrich (Pegasus)
After a post-college stint as a roughneck on a Gulf Coast drilling rig, Goodrich settled down to a scientific career, working for both the U.N. Global Climate Observing System in Geneva and at the Silver Spring, Md., headquarters of NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. In the early 1990s, he began commuting to work by bike from Rockville, Md., a daily round trip of 26 miles. On his retirement in 2011, he logically received not a gold watch but a Gore-Tex jacket.
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[Dave Goodrich’s lessons on climate change]
By then, writes Goodrich, “the notion of combining what I did in the mornings and evenings with what I’d learned in my day job [had become] entrancing.” A few weeks later, he was two-wheeling from Cape Henlopen, Del., to Waldport, Ore. — a 4,208-mile odyssey that would allow him to witness “what changes in the climate system looked like on the ground.”
That may be a flimsy premise to light out for the territories, but show me the travel book with a truly bulletproof rationale. Happily, Goodrich is a good enough reporter — and a sufficiently gifted stylist — to make the miles fly by. And he must have propitiated the cycling gods at the start, for he suffered only one flat tire the entire ride.
All sorts of empirical evidence can be gathered from the seat of a bike, it turns out, especially if the observer has passed this way before. Ascending 10,276-foot-high Cameron Pass in northwestern Colorado, Goodrich searches the surrounding hillsides in vain for the green carpet he recalls from an Outward Bound stint there in the 1970s: Thanks to the tree-toppling mountain pine beetle, “the forests of Cameron Pass were gone. As my breath came back from the climb, there was a slow realization of what had happened. I could remember hiking in the Colorado high country 40 years ago, rock and snow and pine up to the tree line. It was our playground, a place to test ourselves, a place to listen to the quiet. Now it was a ghost forest.”
Believing that climate is “not really that complicated, and that I could explain it if given the chance,” Goodrich broaches the topic with just about everyone he meets along the way. As in this exchange with a volunteer at Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge on the Delaware coast, however, getting people to accept the evidence before their eyes is an uphill battle:
“Are you seeing sea level rise?” Goodrich asks.
“I don’t know about that,” comes the answer, “but the bay has certainly moved in. . . . . What’s killing us is the flood insurance. Getting harder and harder to stay.”
Indeed, denial seems to be washing in on the tide up and down the Eastern Seaboard. In Virginia in 2012, Goodrich notes, the General Assembly did not pass a study on sea level rise until its title was changed to “recurrent flooding.” And in Florida — the state most imperiled by the trend — officials with the Department of Environmental Protection were coerced into replacing “sea level rise” with the anodyne “nuisance flooding.”
[Climate change has created a new literary genre]
Goodrich’s evangelical streak may tempt some to misread the book title as “A--hole in the Wind.” (In reality, “A Hole in the Wind” denotes the author’s yearning for a break from gale-force headwinds in Kansas.) Despite delivering 17 presentations on climate change in eight states, he wakens only slowly to the fact that “in many places climate is a controversial topic. Usually the ‘cold’ email to a science teacher along the route was ignored.”
Might he have overlooked certain inconvenient truths? During a pre-trip talk at Bradley Hills Elementary School in Bethesda, Md., for example, the third-graders’ “real interest was focused more on the bike parked at the front of the room.” And after a lecture to colleagues at NOAA’s Earth Systems Research Lab in Boulder, Colo. — Goodrich hammered 200 miles in 2 1/2 days to arrive at the gig on time — he found “a bigger crowd gathered around my bike after the seminar than around me.”
Yet the man is aces at conveying how climate change — a fact, he cites, endorsed by 97 percent of climate scientists — has been polemicized by documentaries such as “The Great Global Warming Swindle” and ostrich-channeling screeds such as “The Greatest Hoax: How the Global Warming Conspiracy Threatens Your Future” (penned by a certain Oklahoma senator). “Over and over, across the country,” Goodrich discovers, the topic is deemed too hot (sorry) for polite conversation. “You could talk about the weather,” he concludes, “but not the climate.”
So how do you avoid boring readers when narrating a lengthy bike trip with a lofty purpose? You can leaven your text with the occasional harrowing run-in — a pack of vicious dogs in Missouri, say, or railroad tracks that toss you over the handlebars in Kansas — but ultimately you must convince readers that they could tag along and enjoy your company. Goodrich does just that, whether it’s detailing his mythic quest for the perfect college-town coffee shop (“Strange music must fill the air, with lots of people talking intently”) or describing a camping adventure that inadvertently flaunts his range as poet-scientist-humorist:
“That night [in Montana’s fire-ravaged Boulder Valley], wind blew the smoke away and the sky exploded in stars. The earth turned toward Sagittarius and the center of the galaxy, the brightest part of the Milky Way. I fell asleep listening to coyotes in the draw.
“The next morning, I woke to the sound of water on the rain fly. The rancher’s dog was peeing on my tent.”
A HOLE IN THE WIND
A Climate Scientist’s Bicycle Journey Across the United States
By David Goodrich
Pegasus. 249 pp. $27.95