Climate change has already been altering lives on our planet for a generation: the critically acclaimed shows, through Stephan Faris's vivid on-the-ground reporting, that there are unanticipated and surprising effects--some catastrophic and some positive--right around the corner. Global warming will spur the spread of many diseases. The warming world will shift huge populations and potentially redraw political alliances around the globe, driving environmentalists into the hands of anti-immigrant groups. America's coasts are already more difficult places to live as increasing insurance rates make the Gulf Coast and other gorgeous spots prohibitively expensive. Crops will fail in previously lush places and thrive in some formerly barren zones, altering huge industries and remaking traditions. Water scarcity has the potential to inflame and draw the United States into multiple conflicts. Told through the narratives of current, past, and future events, the result of astonishingly wide travel and reporting, is a powerful, gracefully written account that opens our eyes about this most urgent issue and how it has altered and will alter our world.