Bookshop Santa Cruz is delighted to welcome acclaimed writer Rebecca Solnit to the store for a discussion and signing of her most recent book, Orwell’s Roses (in paperback October 18th). This event is cosponsored by The Humanities Institute at UC Santa Cruz.

Bookshop’s head book buyer, Melinda, says: “The gift of Rebecca Solnit is that while she writes about Orwell and his roses, she also writes beyond them, touching on tangential subjects with an effortless grace that is far-ranging and ever-connecting. Coming upon the surviving roses that George Orwell planted in 1936, Solnit writes a captivating series of essays that explores Orwell’s life, the horticulture and literature of roses, and somehow both remarkably and classically Solnit, how one finds balance in the beauty and struggle of 20th century humanity and today.”

Rebecca Solnit is the author of more than twenty books, including the memoir Recollections of My Nonexistence and the nonfiction A Field Guide to Getting Lost, The Faraway Nearby, A Paradise Built in Hell, River of Shadows, and Wanderlust. She is also the author of Men Explain Things to Me and many essays on feminism, activism and social change, hope, and the climate crisis. A product of the California public education system from kindergarten to graduate school, she is a regular contributor to The Guardian and other publications.