In Chesapeake Requiem - A year With the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island (#1,205) journalist Earl Swift spent a year living on Tangier Island, set in the Virginia area of Chesapeake Bay. Tangier has been in the news recently because it is vanishing into the Bay, large chunks of it washing off its shoreline as the island simultaneously sinks. What will the islanders who have lived there for many generations do as their land shrinks and the crabs and oysters that provide their livelihood become scarcer and scarcer? And there are fewer and fewer opportunities for their young folks.
Mr. Swift tells their stories in a sympathetic way only possible by becoming one of their community. He crabbed with them, sat in their "Situation Room" where the men gathered to discuss everything, attended their church services and ate with them.
The islanders have appealed for help to the Army Corps of Engineers, hoping that they would build a breakwater to stem the corrosion, but the wheels of government grind so slowly that likely if the Corps do decide to reinforce part of the island, it will only benefit a potential wildlife preserve, not the people.
Mr. Swift puts the reader right in the middle of island life, and by the time you have finished reading this compelling book, you will feel that you know many of these folks. Right now, the only thing you can do is stayed tuned to the news to see what will happen to them.
If you live in a coastal area anywhere in America, this book should be mandatory reading.
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