Water

Marq de Villiers examines how people use, mishandle, and damage the freshwater that every society depends on. Drawing on ecology, history, and culture, he travels to places where growing populations and unregulated building have pushed local water supplies close to exhaustion, including China, Las Vegas, and the Middle East.

The book also follows the political contests over water that are playing out across the world, along with the everyday pollution that threatens ecosystems. Throughout, de Villiers keeps one eye on these present-day emergencies and the other on the long human story of reliance on water, shaping a narrative about the resource that has sustained civilizations.

It is written for anyone concerned with the environment, public policy, or the future of the water we drink.