SE (AL AR FL GA KY LA MS NC PR SC TN)

 By KATINA GAUDET 

"We have a different fear of hurricanes."

My friend Yasmin was trying to rationalize her fearlessness in the face of an imposing Hurricane Katrina, expected to make landfall near New Orleans the next day, from her first-floor Uptown apartment.

But I was having difficulty, although safe in a hotel room near Memphis. I was frantic, yelling into the phone at Yasmin, "You cannot stay there."

 AMERICA'S WETLAND: LOUISIANA'S VANISHING COAST
 Photographs by Bevil Knapp, text by Mike Dunne Louisiana State 
University Press, $39.95