Rating: 
Summary: A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers aint nothin'...
Review: The writing here is pretty uneven, but at least it's not bad (except for Hill's poetry, which we find too much of). The important thing though is that Ms. Hill is a true American hero, a model for youth in America. Even if Ms. Hill did actually come down out of the tree now and again when no one was looking (which I suspect!),this book rekindles in the reader a sense of the absolute importance of civil disobedience in a culture of capitalism gone amok. The book is an inspiration, a must read. It takes its place among Thoreau's "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers," and then some. I intend to teach this important book in some of my upcoming courses.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent book!
Review: Julia Butterfly Hill is a great environmental acheiver and her heart-felt story of her life in Luna for 2 years, fighting to preserve it is memorable and emotionaly complete story. Anyone who is against clear-cut logging and are against big polluting companies would love this story of a woman who proves that one person can make a difference.
Rating:
Summary: A Needed Message
Review: Hill lives a simple message which took two years and pressure on a corporation to comunicate: are roots are found and nature and its destruction will somehow destroy us all. Despite the simplicity and necessity of Hill's view, I believe that this book could have been longer and more potent. To be fair, Hill's voice comes thorough. She is sincere and honest in her account, and at times seems to spare no details. Still, a reader is certain that there had to have been more going on outside of the tree. One suspects that Hill could have made this book an account of not only her tree-sit or her battle with a seemingly heartless corporation, but it could have been an environmental manifesto comparible to her amazing accomplishment of living in a tree for two whole years. Yet, the book seems to limit itself to Luna and Hill's battles with Pacific Lumber. The other members who helped her in the process should have been discussed more in depth. Overall, however, this book and Hill's accomplishment are truly unforgetable and provide a much needed message of love and respect for all things living.
Rating: 
Summary: Drivel. Absolute Drivel.
Review: Unfortunately, you cannot rate a book below 1 star or I would. "Butterfly" is just another wannabe celebrity trying to cash in on her status (I do not care if the money goes to enviromental groups or not). She "saved" one tree only to publish a book using trees to make the paper... yeah, real enviromentalist. Well, the "mental" part is accurate.
Rating: 
Summary: Butterfly in the branches.
Review: "And so I prayed," twenty-five-year-old Julia Butterfly Hill writes in her book. "I know prayer had taken me to the Lost Coast, prayer is what guided me to the redwood forest, and prayer is what led me to this tree and up this tree" (p. 198). It was also prayer, she tells us, that gave her the strength to live for 738 days (p. 246) on a four-by-seven-foot platform (p. 55) in a 200-foot tall ancient redwood located on Pacific Lumber property (p. 2) in Northern California. During those two years, Julia endured storms, harassment, loneliness and doubt (p. 2). At one point we find her wondering, "how could I convince the loggers to transfer those feelings that they might have for a human being to the forest? And how could I get them to let go of their stereotypes of me? Because in their mind, I was a tree-hugging, granola-eating, dirty, dreadlocked hippie environmentalist (pp. 69-70). Julia did not climb up a tree to escape reality, but to engage herself in the realities of clear cutting. "To me, the tree-sit was not about records of any kind," she explains. "It wasn't even about me . . . I had put my life in a critical position to try to show people what was really at stake. Those old growth forests, once destroyed, would never return" (p. 150). Julia went out on a limb to confront the loggers with their chainsaws and the Pacific Lumber corporate elites face-to-face. And in the process--through her trials and hardships up in the branches of Luna--she experienced an inner transformation. She learned "to live day by day, moment by moment, breath by breath, and prayer by prayer" (p. 119). "The transformation," she observes, "occurs only when we can look at ourselves squarely and face our attachments and inner demons, free from the buzz of commercial distractions and false social realities. We have to retreat into our own cocoons and come face-to-face with who we are" (p. 118). Ultimately, it is a brave butterfly that emerges from these pages. However, I agree with Robert Parker's comments below in that Julia missed an ideal opportunity to write a more compelling book to shelve alongside WALDEN, DESERT SOLITAIRE, and THE SAND COUNTY ALMANAC. Julia nevertheless succeeds in dispelling the tree-sitter stereotype and the us-versus-them mentality; in her book, she could pass for anyone's favorite daughter or endearing little sister. She also shows us how to love the forest through the trees. And for those longing for another visit with Julia in the branches of Luna, check out Joan Dunning's five-star, FROM THE REDWOOD FOREST: ANCIENT TREES. G. Merritt
Rating:
Summary: useful
Review: I read this book to do a book report on I didnt think I would like it because I'm afraid of hights. When I got done with this book I told all my friend to read it. This book I thing is about a woman how wanted to travil the world and ended up in a tree protesting to save the Redwoods for almost two years. I loved this book and Julia is a amazing woman.
Rating:
Summary: amazing story,very simply written
Review: The book in itself is not really a good book,but the story is incredible.It jumps from one chapter to the other,doesn't have a good structure,doesn't handle the peaks and downs of the story well.It is even corny at some points(to my taste).The end dissapears without noticing and it seems that nobody helped Julia in the writing so that the book will be at the level of her powerful life story.But I totally forgive her out of respect and because the book moved me anyways.I read it in 1 day.I found it very inspiring and I recommend it.
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Summary: No lack of writing skills
Review: Like most of the reviewers here, I was tremendously impressed by this book. I was puzzled, though, why so many readers felt Julia Butterfly Hill lacks writing skills. Yes, there were a few typos (which speaks more to the lack of editing than writing), but Hill's voice here is strong and immediate. I felt myself drawn into her world as quickly and surely as in any non-fiction or fiction I can think of. She has a masterful sense of when and how to create dramatic tension -- her description of the helicopter buzzing was chilling -- and she is similarly excellent in describing the important personalities and her relationship to them, in particular her negotiations with John Campbell, President of Pacific Lumber. Finally, in my view, the telling of the story was placed in an adequate context, complete with a well-argued opposition to the Headwaters deal. Whether this will become an environmental classic, I can't say. But Hill accomplished what she set out to do.
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Summary: Heartfelt memoir that lights a candle in the darkness
Review: Julia Butterfly Hill, an extraordinary woman, has written an equally extraordinary book detailing her two years living on a small platform hundreds of feet up "Luna," an ancient California redwood. What drives a young woman to give so much of herself, even risking her life, for the sake of a tree? The answers are fascinating, and reveal how much more is at stake than only a single redwood. Julia Hill is that rare individual: a political activist who is above partisan rancor; a moralist who transcends ideologies. Because of this, she draws fire from all sides, since she is bound to offend those who offer their allegiance to political orthodoxies. But here she writes a compelling and vivid tale that is wonderfully cinematic and sparkles with her wit and insight, more than justifying her new incarnation as one of the brightest and most personable spokespersons for environmentalism one would hope to find. In "Legacy of Luna," we learn how this itinerant preacher's daughter came to a fuller awareness of what was important in life after her brush with death in a terrible auto accident. She finds her higher cause in the old-growth forests of the West Coast, where environmentalists desperately place their own bodies in harm's way in an effort to stop overlogging. Like an early Christian aescetic, she soon found herself suspended in the air, nearer to heaven, hoping for a miracle, while the world watched. Defying all attempts by the Maxxam Corporation to force her from her perch, surviving storms, cold, and loneliness, Julia describes in this remarkable book exactly why the old-growth forests are worth preserving and shares the lessons she learned from her long ordeal. She writes about the media frenzy that developed, about the celebrities who offered support, and how she maintained her sanity and perspective in dealing with the whirlwind her action created. Heroes come from the strangest places and sometimes do what appear to be the strangest things. The truest heroes are those who inspire the rest of us to heroic living, and no one who reads this book with an open heart will fail to be inspired by Julia Butterfly Hill's saga of courage and love.
Rating:
Summary: Re:TREESITTERS
Review: This is a book that starts out strong, but gets tired as it goes along. It's an intriguing story of how the autrhor lasted for two years under difficult conditions living high in a tree. The storms that rocked her platform, the helicopter that flew two close were too big challenges. Then the phone calls and the radio interviews as everyone came to know her name. Getting to know the tree and herself as the time continued to pass. As the long negotiations wore on, she seems to tire. Two years is a very long time to spend in such a limited space. Her world was more vertical than horizontal. Still a very good read and inspiring story. Thanks to Julia for living the story and then writing it down.
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