Tamara Dean

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Kelly Kendall

A close-up of Tamara Dean.

Tamara Dean

media release: Please join us to celebrate the launch of Shelter and Storm: At Home in the Driftless, by Tamara Dean, at the UW-Madison Arboretum Visitor Center, 1207 Seminole Highway Madison, WI 53711, on Thursday, April 24, 2025, at 7:00 PM.

The author will give a presentation, then be joined in conversation by Jane Elder, environmental strategist and former executive director of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters.

A book signing and light refreshments will follow.

Books will be available for purchase on-site courtesy of The Arboretum Bookstore.

Refreshments provided by Tricky Foods catering.

In the midst of the environmental crises of the early twenty-first century, Tamara Dean sought a way to live lightly on the planet. Her quest drew her to a landscape unlike any other: the Driftless Area of Wisconsin, a region untouched by glaciers, marked by steep hills and deeply carved valleys, capped with forests and laced with cold, spring-fed streams. There, she confronted, in ways large and small, the challenges of meeting basic needs while facing the ravages of climate change—an experience at once soul-stirring and practical that she recounts in Shelter and Storm.

Dean’s boundless curiosity and gift for storytelling imbue these essays with urgency and a sense of adventure. She invites readers to share in her discoveries while hunting for water, learning that a persistent weed could be food, or burning a hayfield to recreate a prairie. Contending with the fallout of fires, floods, and tornadoes, she offers responses to natural disasters that reflect the importance of community, now and for generations to come. Whether tracking down a rare, blue-glowing firefly, engineering a beaver-friendly waterway to appease a dying neighbor, or building a house of earthen blocks, Dean unites personal experience with science and history, presenting a perspective as informative as it is compelling.

Keenly attentive to the stakes for our planet’s future—and the implications of extreme weather, shifting agricultural practices, and political divides—Shelter and Storm illuminates a thoughtful way forward for anyone concerned about climate change and its far-reaching consequences or for anyone searching, as Dean has, for a more sustainable way to live.

Tamara Dean has been camping, fishing, hiking, and gathering wild foods from an early age, led and inspired by her parents. Her essays and stories have been published in The American Scholar, The Georgia Review, the Guardian, One Story, Orion, and The Progressive, and she is author of The Human-Powered Home: Choosing Muscles over Motors. She teaches writing independently and through writing centers across the nation.

Jane Elder is an advocate for Great Lakes protection, author of the memoir and policy critique, Wilderness, Water & Rust, and a consultant on nonprofit leadership and strategic communications.

More details:

• The event is free and open to the public, but registration is required.
• Doors open at 6:30 PM. Presentation begins at 7:00 PM.
• We strive to host inclusive, accessible events that enable all individuals, including individuals with disabilities, to engage fully. To request an accommodation or for inquiries about accessibility, please contact Heather Skinner at presspr@umn.edu.