Long ago, in a time forgotten, a wet climate threw the dunes of the Nebraska Sandhills out of balance. Grasslands proliferated, stabilizing dune complexes as upwelling groundwater birthed a horde of shallow lakes. In a land where temperatures can exceed 100 degrees Fahrenheit and plummet well-below freezing, change is afoot. The cold is returning, and in the frozen wastes of the Nebraska Sandhills, ice is amassing across lakes. Yet, summer grassland wildfires abound; initiating novel environmental circumstances for Sandhills lakes. At the center of these events lies climate change, a disturbance as harsh and unyielding as the windswept and sun-bleached Sandhills.

Sweeping from a harsh land of cold to a summertime of scorching heat, A Study of Ice and Fire tells a tale of nitrogen, phosphorous and algae, who come together in the unrelenting maelstrom of biogeochemical cycles and environmental change. Here, groundwater inputs and evaporation form complex and nutrient-rich brines; lake color reveals cryptic ecological dynamics; seasonal and interannual variability carries limnologists off into madness; algal biomass proliferates; lake ice cover waxes and wanes in accordance with atmospheric temperatures; dissolved oxygen is consumed entirely under ice cover, ferrying fish beyond the Wall; wildfire ash blunts the advance of light into aquatic environments; and nitrogen-limited lakes remain unspoiled by the hot tongue of fire.

Amid sinking watercraft and labyrinths of undocumented R code, treacherous lab and field work, cruel budget cuts and victorious grant applications, high-stakes committee meetings and conspiratorial coffee breaks, allies and crafty PhD advisors, the story of the Sandhills lakes unfolds, as an intrepid limnologists endeavors to survive that deadliest of conflicts: graduate school.