For millennia humans knew the stars as well as we know our own backyards. Yet, today many if not most of us have lost vital connections with our natural world, and so have in many ways lost our sense of wonder. In the thoughtful, genre-bending nonfiction tradition of Wendell Berry and Walker Percy, Dale Allison charts the effects of loss of wonder in Western society. Mining insights from ancient creation myths to contemporary children's books, he highlights our ongoing disconnect from the cosmos, tracing its spiritual and philosophical impact. In eight elegant and profound essays, "The Luminous Dusk" calls readers to a life of sustained wonder, open to God and connected to his creation, a life that chooses divine ascent over our culture's reflexive mediocrity.