In The State of Water: Understanding California's Most Precious Resource, Obi Kaufmann, author of the best-selling California Field Atlas, turns his artful yet analytical attention to the Golden State's single most complex and controversial resource: water.

In this new book, full-color maps unravel the braided knot of California's water infrastructure and ecosystems, exposing a history of unlimited growth in spite of finite natural resources--a history that has led to its current precarious circumstances.

Yet this built world depends upon the biosphere, and in The State of Water Kaufmann argues that environmental conservation and restoration efforts are necessary not only for ethical reasons but also as a matter of human survival.