REGISTRATION REQUIRED. Join us for an outdoor book club that focuses on our natural world. We discuss our all-time favorite nature titles, both fiction and non-fiction. The book club meets at parks throughout St. Johns County, practically in your own backyard!

This month we’ll be reading Untamed: The wildest woman in America and the fight for Cumberland Island by Will Harlan and will be meeting at Vaill Point Park. Carol Ruckdeschel is the wildest woman in America. She wrestles alligators, eats roadkill, rides horses bareback, and lives in a ramshackle cabin that she built by hand in an island wilderness. A combination of Henry David Thoreau and Jane Goodall, Carol is a self-taught scientist who has become a tireless defender of sea turtles on Cumberland Island, a national park off the coast of Georgia. Cumberland, the country’s largest and most biologically diverse barrier island, is celebrated for its windswept dunes and feral horses. Steel magnate Thomas Carnegie once owned much of the island, and in recent years, Carnegie heirs and the National Park Service have clashed with Carol over the island’s future. What happens when a dirt-poor naturalist with only a high school diploma becomes an outspoken advocate on a celebrated but divisive island? Untamed is the story of an American original standing her ground and fighting for what she believes in, no matter the cost.

This event is free and open to the public, but registration is required. If the weather is sunny, please bring your own camp chair for sitting out under the trees. If it’s rainy, we’ll be sitting in the park pavilion. Feel free to bring your own snacks & beverages! Please notify us at least 3 days in advance if you should need a sign language interpreter. This title is available in e-book format on our Hoopla platform.  If you’d like a print copy, please contact Amy at aackerman@sjcfl.us or 904.827.6942.

This book club is a partnership between the St. Johns County Public Library System and the St. Johns County Parks & Recreation Department.  Some materials are supplied by the Friends of the Main Library St. Augustine.