- Scientist - Author - Storyteller -
Book
My first creative nonfiction book, 'Bogland', will be published in October 2026. There will be a book launch event hosted by the Boulder Bookstore on October 29th, so if you are in Colorado please consider attending!
US Publisher, W.W. Norton & Company
Boglands have long been dismissed as wastelands—too sodden to farm, too perilous to cross, too unruly to be considered beautiful. Yet come closer and a strange truth emerges: These unconventional landscapes are fascinating paradoxes that stretch our minds, hold the history of humanity, and will shape the future of our planet. As acclaimed ecologist Merritt R. Turetsky reveals, here between the borders of land and water, bogs conjure new life forms—acid-flinging mosses, amphibian-eating plants—from an overabundance of death. The past and present commingle with uncanny intimacy as ancient lives linger in remarkable states of preservation. Even as bogs sequester nearly one third of Earth’s soil carbon, accelerating exploitation risks swiftly transforming them from climate allies to climate foes.
Gorgeously written, Bogland is an ode and a call to action: To value these places precisely for their refusal to conform, and to learn from them new ways to adapt, endure, and belong on our changing planet—before it’s too late.
UK Publisher, Profile Books
The book is being marketed in the United Kingdom by Profile Books with a slightly different title, a remarkably vivid cover, but the same creative science storytelling!
Pre-order this version of the book from Waterstones or Hatchards.
Endorsements for Bogland
“Merritt Turetsky is so enraptured by bogs, so full of wide-eyed passion for them, and so skilled at recasting them as the magical wonderlands that they secretly are, that you cannot help but be swept away.”
—Ed Yong, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of An Immense World
“Bogland is one of those rare and exciting books that can change bad situations in the way that Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring did in the nineteen-sixties. . . . This journey is more than a rich and loving appreciation of the world-wide kingdom of sphagnum bogs. . . . [Merritt] Turetsky asks readers to help her support and rescue the world’s endangered and failing boglands that are struggling to hold the earth together. . . . If you enjoy breathing, you should join us and answer the call.”
—Annie Proulx, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of Fen, Bog & Swamp
“Bogland invites us to consider the quiet power of Earth's darkest, dankest layers. With infectious care and curiosity, Merritt Turetsky reveals the rich histories and ecological wonders buried in bogs around the world. A beautiful ode to one of Earth's most overlooked environments.”
—Laura Poppick, author of Strata: Stories from Deep Time
“Writing with a love and intimacy born from decades of immersion in these undervalued landscapes, Merritt Turetsky takes readers deep into boglands to witness the surprising beauty of peat: its mystery, its plants and animals, its crucial role in the future of Earth’s climate. You will learn not only how important and fragile these ecosystems are—and how much we stand to lose if we don’t change the way we consider them—but also how to look beyond the obvious, how to love places that aren’t dramatic, but rather exist quietly, enduring and supportive. Everyone who makes decisions about land use—simply everyone, actually—should read this book.”
—Anna Chilvers, co-editor of The Book of Bogs
Events