Six Walks in the Footsteps of Henry David Thoreau by Ben Shattuck

What if you could walk alongside Thoreau—not just through his pages, but through the very landscapes that shaped his vision? Ben Shattuck, a Maine-based writer and artist, invites you to do exactly that in this luminous collection of essays.

Six Walks traces Thoreau’s footsteps across New England—from the salt marshes of Cape Cod to the quiet woods of Concord—blending natural history, personal reflection, and literary pilgrimage into something wholly original. Shattuck doesn’t just retrace routes; he excavates meaning, asking what it means to walk deliberately in an age of distraction, to seek wildness when wilderness feels increasingly distant.

These essays are gorgeously crafted, each one a meditation on attention, solitude, and the radical act of slowing down. Shattuck writes with the precision of a naturalist and the soul of a poet, capturing the shimmer of light on water, the crunch of frost underfoot, the way a landscape can crack you open if you let it.

Perfect for readers who loved Braiding Sweetgrass or The Old Ways, this book is a balm for anyone craving deeper connection—to place, to history, to the quiet rhythms that ground us. Whether you’re a Thoreau devotee or simply someone who needs an excuse to lace up your boots and head outside, Six Walks is an invitation you won’t want to refuse.

A beautiful companion for coastal wanderers and armchair philosophers alike.