The Last Winter

The Scientists, Adventurers, Journeymen, and Mavericks Trying to Save the World

By: Porter Fox

Narrated by: Jeremy Arthur

One man’s “curiously thrilling joyride” of travelogue, history, and climatology, across a planet on the brink of cataclysmic transformation.

As the planet warms, winter is shrinking. In the last 50 years, the Northern Hemisphere lost a million square miles of spring snowpack and in the US alone, snow cover has been reduced by 15-30 percent. On average, winter has shrunk by a month in most northern latitudes.

In this deeply researched, beautifully written, and adventure-filled book, journalist Porter Fox travels along the edge of the Northern Hemisphere's snow line to track the scope of this drastic change, and how it will literally change everything — from rapid sea level rise, to fresh water scarcity for two billion people, to massive greenhouse gas emissions from thawing permafrost, and a half dozen climate tipping points that could very well spell the end of our world.

This original research is animated by four harrowing and illuminating journeys — each grounded by interviews with idiosyncratic, charismatic experts in their respective fields and Fox's own narrative of growing up on a remote island in Northern Maine.

Timely, atmospheric, and expertly investigated, The Last Winter will showcase a shocking and unexpected casualty of climate change - that may well set off its own unstoppable warming cycle.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2021 Porter Fox (P)2021 Little, Brown & Company

Critic reviews

“Before the snowpack vanishes and the glaciers melt away, The Last Winter takes us on a tour of all we are poised to lose - the beauties and elations and wonders, both natural and human, to be found in frigid latitudes and altitudes. Fox is an ideal guide. He writes perceptively and knowledgably but also lovingly about the places and people he encounters along the way. The result is a curiously thrilling joyride that makes you marvel and grieve.” (Donovan Hohn, author of Moby-Duck and The Inner Coast)

“The importance of ice was not as clear to me as it should have been. It is now. This is a rousing, literate, multi-continental tour of the cryosphere. Check it out: The end of winter, if we fail to prevent it, will be the end of the world as we know it.” (William Finnegan, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Barbarian Days)

“From its gripping opening pages to its haunting conclusion, Porter Fox's The Last Winter is poised to become a landmark text in climate change literature. Yet this isn't a dry, doleful book. Instead, it's filled with often gorgeous prose and fascinating, indelible characters who seem to have gone AWOL from a Paul Theroux or Peter Mathiessen novel. Riveting, unforgettable, and important.” (Tom Bissell, author of Chasing the Sea and Apostle)