How does author, William Sleator, portray logging?

The issue of logging America's forests permeates the narrative, although its pros and cons are only shallowly mentioned. The denuded tracts of land that Doug sees indicates that the loggers in the novel are practicing the kind of logging that most environmentalists regard as the most damaging: clearcutting. The loggers chop down everything in their way, leaving landscapes that appear blasted and dead.

In The Beasties, Sleator personifies the deadly effects of clearcutting, which kills wild animals by killing their homes, in the form of the beasties, intelligent creatures of the forest who can give voice to the misery of the forest's wildlife. Through the beasties, Sleator portrays the logging as a genocidal war upon wildlife; the beasties respond by waging a guerrilla war against the people responsible for cutting down their trees.