Edge Effects is currently looking for reviews of scholarly monographs and trade nonfiction books that address environmental issues, capaciously defined.
We aim to publish generous and engaging reviews (~1000–1500 words) that will be of interest to academics, students, and members of the general public. Instead of traditional academic reviews that describe books and evaluate their contributions, we’re interested in creative reviews that tell us something about why you think this book matters now. We’re particularly excited to read reviews that:
- Include moments of personal narrative and/or reflection on the reviewer’s reading experience in ways that meaningfully contribute to the reviewer’s take on the book;
- Place the book’s interventions, themes, and import in context of current events;
- Pair the book under review with a new streaming series, film, album, game, or other cultural production.
If you are interested in writing a review for Edge Effects, we want to hear from you!
Please email our managing editor at edgeeffects@nelson.wisc.edu with the title of the text you wish to review, a short bio, and a brief explanation (~250 words) of why you’d like to review it for Edge Effects. If it’s a good fit, we will arrange to send you a review copy. Graduate students, early career scholars, and independent academics are especially encouraged to get in touch.
While we welcome you to contact us about books you’d like to write about, we are actively seeking reviews of the following books.
- Naisargi N. Davé, Indifference: On the Praxis of Interspecies Being (Duke University Press, 2023)
- Robert Macfarlane, Is a River Alive? (Penguin 2025)
- Stacey Alaimo, The Abyss Stares Back: Encounters with Deep Sea Life (University of Minnesota Press, 2025 — digital ARC available)
- Jeremy Chow, The Queerness of Water: Troubled Ecologies in the Eighteenth Century (University of Virginia Press, 2023)
- Bench Ansfield, Born in Flames: The Business of Arson and the Remaking of the American City (W.W. Norton, 2025)
- Andrew L. Hipp, Oak Origins: From Acorns to Species and the Tree of Life (University of Chicago Press, 2024)
- Christopher Kondrich, Lucy Spelman, and Susan Tacent, Creature Needs: Writers Respond to the Science of Animal Conservation (University of Minnesota Press, 2025)
- Noreen K. Mokuau et al., Ka Māno Wai: The Source of Life (University of Hawai’i Press, 2023)
- Akihiro Ogawa, Antinuclear Citizens: Sustainability Policy and Grassroots Activism in Post-Fukushima Japan (Stanford University Press, 2023)
- Leigh Claire La Berge, Marx for Cats: a Radical Bestiary (Duke University Press, 2023)
- Micah Mckay, Trash and Limits in Latin American Culture (University of Florida Press, 2024)
We are also interested in reviews of the following films/series:
- White Noise (Netflix 2022)
- True Detective: Season 4 (Max)
Featured image: Typewriter on a table. Photo by Patrick Fore, 2017.