What happens to vast, sprawling landscapes when the humans who live there suddenly leave? Cal Flyn set about to answer that question in her new book, Islands of Abandonment, visiting the forests of Chernobyl, the post-industrial bings of Scotland and abandoned factories in New Jersey to document the new forms of wildlife that have cropped up since. She joins the Prospect Interview to talk about theories of succession, what post-Soviet farmland has to do with global warming, and why she chose to write a book on nature shot through with hope. 

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