The Age of Waiting by Douglas J. Penick is a personal memoir enriched by the history of Buddhism and a re-telling of foundational Buddhist tales. Penick confronts not only his own mortality, but also that of the planet. This eloquent, impassioned investigation links our contemporary reality - with its medical, economic, and ecological emergencies - to an inner landscape which may prove more constant, durable, and transformative than we realize.

In this illuminating work, Penick explores contemporary crises using the frame of a classic story from Buddhism… By reflecting on personal as well as global issues, Penick models an unflinching but also compassionate orientation toward life.

• Publisher’s Weekly

A brilliant, compassionate, heart-breakingly written, woven, acknowledgement of the unimaginable Anthropocene rolling toward us. Douglas Penick Writes with insight and wisdom, with Buddhist stories, with the life of the Buddha, with turning points in his life with his Teacher, Trungpa Rinpoche, and with touching, telling alightings from his own life from childhood until his aging (slightly) now. Well worth anything you can give to its reading, musing, in this vast humming, in this Ocean of Buddhas.

• Zentatsu Richard Baker