Shelter and Storm: At Home in the Driftless

by Tamara Dean

Living mindfully with nature during a time of uncertainty
 

In the midst of the environmental crises of the early twenty-first century, Tamara Dean sought a way to live lightly on the planet. Her quest drew her to a landscape unlike any the Driftless Area of Wisconsin, a region untouched by glaciers, marked by steep hills and deeply carved valleys, capped with forests and laced with cold, spring-fed streams. There, she confronted, in ways large and small, the challenges of meeting basic needs while facing the ravages of climate change—an experience at once soul-stirring and practical that she recounts in Shelter and Storm.

 

Dean’s boundless curiosity and gift for storytelling imbue these essays with urgency and a sense of adventure. She invites readers to share in her discoveries while hunting for water, learning that a persistent weed could be food, or burning a hayfield to recreate a prairie. Contending with the fallout of fires, floods, and tornadoes, she offers responses to natural disasters that reflect the importance of community, now and for generations to come. Whether tracking down a rare, blue-glowing firefly, engineering a beaver-friendly waterway to appease a dying neighbor, or building a house of earthen blocks, Dean unites personal experience with science and history, presenting a perspective as informative as it is compelling.

 

Keenly attentive to the stakes for our planet’s future—and the implications of extreme weather, shifting agricultural practices, and political divides—Shelter and Storm illuminates a thoughtful way forward for anyone concerned about climate change and its far-reaching consequences or for  anyone searching, as Dean has, for a more sustainable way to live.

Genres: Nature, Nonfiction, Memoir

199 pages, Paperback

First published April 22, 2025

Reviews

[liv · Rating 5 out of 5]

so well written and i learned so much about this area of wisconsin!! plus i got to interview the author who was incredibly nice

[Brenna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Covering a wide range of topics deeply rooted through her strong sense of place, I appreciated that these stories wove together historical documents, current events, scientific studies, and personal experiences to present new perspectives of a familiar region and its people, plants, animals, waters, landscapes, past, future, challenges, and resilience.

[Staci · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked Shelter and Storm overall and enjoyed reading it, but it wasn’t quite what I expected going in.

I was really interested in the homesteading aspects of the story—learning how the author worked with the land, built a home, dealt with nature, and handled the day-to-day challenges of living more simply in the Driftless region of Wisconsin. Those parts were fascinating and were honestly my favorite sections of the book.

At times, though, the book shifted more into political and environmental discussions than I was hoping for. While those topics are certainly connected to the bigger picture of land stewardship and climate concerns, I personally would have enjoyed more focus on the practical homestead experiences and the complications that come with that lifestyle.

That said, it’s still a well-written and thoughtful book. I’m glad I read it, and there were definitely parts that were interesting and thought-provoking.

Read if you like:
• Nature writing and environmental reflections
• Memoirs about living close to the land
• Homesteading and rural life stories
• Books that mix personal experience with bigger ideas about sustainability

[Kellylynn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one was an interesting one for me, part memoir but mostly short stories/essays, with a heavy focus on the environment. The first few really pulled me in and I felt engaged but as chapters moved along it felt like the author lost the way on telling the stories. The later ones seemed to ramble along and retell things. There may have been a few points where I skimmed ahead a little.

Overall I felt it was nice reading about her decision and move to the country to become closer with the land. The learning of cultivation and community.

I won this in one of the giveaways.

[Sue Hedin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A memoir of homesteading in the 21st century in the driftless area of Wisconsin near the Mississippi River. So close to home. A good mix of environmental writing (tornados, floods, native plant conservation) and personal struggles.

[Michael Doane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shelter and Storm: At Home in the Driftless is a thoughtful, grounded meditation on what it means to live responsibly within a changing climate not in abstraction, but through daily, embodied practice. In this quietly powerful collection of essays, Tamara Dean documents her decision to root herself in Wisconsin’s Driftless Area, a landscape shaped not by glaciers but by time, water, and resilience, and to learn how to meet basic human needs in a world increasingly defined by environmental uncertainty.

Dean’s strength lies in her ability to merge curiosity with humility. She approaches the land not as a conqueror or idealist, but as a careful listener learning how water moves, how plants sustain, how fire reshapes prairie, and how weather tests both infrastructure and community. Her encounters range from the intimate to the elemental: hunting for potable water, discovering sustenance in invasive weeds, and experimenting with earthen construction, all while navigating floods, fires, and tornadoes that underscore the urgency of her undertaking.

What elevates Shelter and Storm beyond a personal experiment is its integration of science, history, and communal responsibility. Dean situates her experiences within broader ecological systems and cultural divides, exploring how agriculture, politics, and climate adaptation intersect in rural America. Moments of wonder such as tracking a rare bioluminescent firefly or reengineering a waterway to accommodate beavers coexist with sober reckonings about loss, instability, and the limits of individual action.

Yet the book never tips into despair. Instead, Dean offers a vision of sustainability rooted in attentiveness, cooperation, and care for both human and nonhuman neighbors. Her prose is clear-eyed and inviting, making complex ecological realities accessible without diluting their seriousness. The Driftless landscape becomes both setting and teacher, shaping a narrative that feels urgent, practical, and quietly hopeful.

Shelter and Storm will resonate deeply with readers concerned about climate change, land stewardship, and sustainable living not as lifestyle branding, but as a moral and communal practice. It is a book that asks not how we can escape crisis, but how we might learn to live well within it.

[Christine DeSmet · Rating 5 out of 5]

This 2025 nonfiction book is a superbly researched and entertaining memoir about the time period in which Tamara and her husband David go back to the land in southwestern Wisconsin. The reader is along for the ride when they build a house from mud bricks, grow vegetables, dig for water and use it to heat their home, restore a prairie, save ponds and streams, fight fires and clean up after tornadoes with neighbors. They also witnessed unique things in nature’s animals and found rare insects. They got involved with helping organizations monitor changes in nature near the Mississippi. Dean shares mistakes, joy, and worries as she delves into the history of the land and people, including the effect of rural electrification and changes in health customs affecting women in particular and rural people in general. Southwestern Wisconsin and the Kickapoo Valley region are part of a beautiful hilly zone known as the Driftless where glaciers stopped and therefore didn’t scrub the land flat nor deposit debris called “drift.”

[Kenneth Feeney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read a number books about the Driftless Area both fiction and non-fiction. I first found out about the Driftless Area in 1978 when I was assigned to Fort McCoy, Wisconsin. I passed through Viroqua, WI a number of times. I now live on the Iowa side of the Driftless.

This book is less about the cultural relationships with fellow Driftless residents. This is more about living lightly in light of climate challenges and how it effects the area. I think of the 2007 flood that devastated Soldiers Grove, WI from the Kickapoo River. The same flood hit Gays Mills.

Tamara Dean also talks about the river muscles which clean the waters of the Mississippi and how they are disappearing.

It is not what I expected but I was engrossed with her writing and the challenges of living in a unique geological area of the United States.

[Carol]

Tamara Dean's collection of essays reads like a love letter to the beautiful Driftless area of southwest Wisconsin. But like any real relationship, it has its ups and downs - including, in her case, debilitating bouts with Lyme disease brought on by exposure to ticks due to time spent in nature. I appreciate all that she shares about the special nature of the area, ranging from fire and floods to fireflies and farming. Her reflections on endangered mussels and abortion in 19th century Wisconsin are based on personal insights as well as research well documented in the acknowledgements. This is a book to be savored at a country pace, even when reading it in a city.

Please note that I don't use the star rating system, so this review should not be viewed as a zero.

[Kathy Piehl · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the essays because she was able to incorporate a number of topics with what she was experiencing in this particular part of the world. We've driven through that area a number of times. However, because some of the essays had been published separately in a number of publications, there was some overlap about when/why she and her partner moved there, and I wasn't always clear on the sequence of events in their lives. I wish there had been some explanation in an introduction or afterward. That said, I certainly enjoyed her writing and would like to read more of her work.

[Deb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved the bits about the topography, geology, and history of the driftless area in this collection of previously published essays by Tamara Dean. However, my take on this book is similar to my attitude toward almost all memoirs (and the reason I tend to avoid reading them) -- so many words about the trials and tribulations of the author. It gets tiresome....
I thought it was unfortunate to end the book with the essay about the author's struggles with Lyme disease as it left the reader with a rather negative perspective on this beautiful area of our country.

[Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book of essays on a wide range of topics, mostly concerning the natural world, with a particular focus on the many difficulties the author faced in her attempt to live in the country. It's true that rural living takes more effort than living in a city (we've done both), but having a good, safe well for water and perhaps not making homemade bricks to build a house, along with other more mainstream choices, could have lightened the workload and perhaps contributed to a successful life on the land.

[Bridget · Rating 4 out of 5]

Met this author at Next Chapter Books in St Paul. She was very interesting. I had not heard of the Driftless area prior to this year (or so I thought, but I guess I did read a fictional book called Driftless in 2018). The essays were interesting and made me realize what a city dweller I am. Making my own house out of clay bricks, surviving floods, surviving 3 bouts of Lyme disease, creating a pollinator farm and an extensive vegetable garden from scratch - it's hard to imagine doing that work. Yikes.

[Suzanne Finney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved getting to know the people and landscape of Wisconsin’s Driftless region. Each essay tells its own story but together they reveal a larger story of a woman exploring her role in the natural world, challenging herself to live sustainably, taking ethical action in a changing world. None of her decisions come lightly; Tamara Dean is a highly intelligent, passionate and thoughtful guide through the ups and downs of rural life. Her curiosity and depth of insight coupled with evocative and expressive writing makes Shelter and Storm a book I will treasure forever.

[Kristine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This memoir is part love story--of falling for a place so deeply it becomes home, even at great cost--and part clear-eyed reporting of the science that makes a place what it is: water, soil, symbiosis among its occupants. Tamara Dean's portrait of the mystical Midwestern Driftless Region makes her choice--to stay, in the path of certain devastation, or to leave land she loves--a heartbreak either way. Readers who cherish the epic inner ecosystems of Leopold, Carson, Tempest Williams, Niedecker, or Berry will find this book at home on their shelves!

[Jane Schmidt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dean's book is engaging from one story to the next about an area that's equally intriguing. Her writing style keeps the reader moving forward with the rhythm of the Driftless land. From fires to floods and a search for slow blue fireflies, Dean paints a picture of life in the country that many folks will never experience. This book is highly recommended for anyone who's ever dreamed of moving to the country, as well as those who already have their roots firmly in the dirt.

[Bev · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shelter and Storm, Tamara Dean

Non fiction book about a writer and her husband’s experience moving from city life to farm life. They experience about everything you can imagine from fire to flood to tornado but worse was Lyme disease. The awe and beauty of the area is what kept them going. They had some amazing sites including blue flashing lightning bugs.
Very well written, though not highly compelling because of the genre. 4.5 stars

[Rachel Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed learning about this pocket of Wisconsin and thinking about climate change, sustainable gardening, and life in rural America. A few paragraphs in the later essays repeated information we already knew from earlier essays but it's understandable since many of these essays were published elsewhere.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of essays, some I had read before in journals and magazines, by a local author. Dean lives not far from me and I am familiar with her part of the Driftless area. I appreciate her observations and her interests in land and water and the creatures all around. She writes of places and events I am familiar with but learn more from her as well. Excellent regional writing.

[David de Felice · Rating 4 out of 5]

The simple life isn’t so

Thoroughly enjoyed this book about the author and her husband carving a life out of nature in Wisconsin’s Driftless Area. From building a sod brick home, to surviving floods and tornadoes, accidents, and disease, it is a personal account of living with and abetting nature.

[Ruba Abu Ali · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a thoughtful collection of essays!
Ms Dean is a gifted storyteller. This is a tribute to the sustainable way of living, climate change awareness, and the sensitivity to and unity with nature at its finest.

[Lisa Henner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terrific book! Dean is an extraordinary storyteller and prose stylist—her enthusiasm and curiosity are contagious. The essays are both personal and universal. My only complaint is that I wanted to read more.

[Jenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Well-written essays that tied a strong sense of place and an insight into the author's personal experience with the land that she loves. I don't think I would have been as interested in the book however, if it didn't take place in the driftless are of Wisconsin.

[Lynne Kolze · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pleasant read about one of my favorite Midwestern ecosystems and one woman's connection to and experiences living within that landscape.

[John Brugge · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovely stories of life in such a lovely area of Wisconsin.

[Sessi Fletcher · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was so stinkin special to my heart!!! I’m so glad to be in Wisconsin now.

[Tammy Gifft · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very unusual book but if you like eclectic chapters that deal with living on the Driftless part of Wisconsin, this is a book for you.

[Kelsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really interesting wide-ranging set of essays on topics with a connection to the Driftless - including the 2018 flood, birth control in the 1800s, freshwater mussels, and Lymes disease.

[Randal White · Rating 5 out of 5]

I grew up in the same area of Wisconsin that the author writes about in this book. I've been gone from there for the last 40 years, but retain the memories and lessons learned from there. The author, through a series of essays, describes some of the wonders and the disasters of living there. It is not an easy place to farm or homestead in. If the bugs don't get you, and the cold doesn't crush your spirit, there's still a dozen more ways that nature can upset plans. But the good points.....the wildlife, the natural beauty of the land, the way your neighbors help you when you need it, are what can make it worthwhile to live there.
Dean manages to express the ups and downs in a very beautiful writing style. She drew out memories and emotions that I didn't remember I had,
An excellent writer, she manages to do just that, time after time.
Now the problem with the book: Dean has succeeded in waking up the life I enjoyed back there, and left me with a bad case of home sickness! Not a bad problem to have, it just makes me appreciate the life I have had, and the hope for it in my future.
Excellent book!