1) Ritchison, Gary. Springer. Hardbound: 2506 pages in 3 volumes. Price: $159.99 U.S.
PUBLISHER’S SUMMARY: With more than 10,000 species that vary in size, use diverse habitats that extend across latitudes and altitudes, consume a wide variety of food items, differ in how they fly (or not), communicate, and reproduce, and have different life histories, birds exhibit remarkable variation in form (anatomy) and function (physiology). Our understanding of how natural selection has generated this variation as birds evolved and as different species adapted to their unique circumstances has grown considerably in recent years. In In a Class of Their Own: A Detailed Examination of Avian Forms and Functions, this variation is explained in great detail, beginning with an overview of avian evolution and continuing with information about the structure and function of the avian skeleton, muscles, and the various body systems. Other chapters focus on avian locomotion (including flight), migration, navigation, communication, energy balance and thermoregulation, and various aspects of avian reproduction, such as nests and nest building, clutch sizes, and parental care. In a Class of Their Own: A Detailed Examination of Avian Forms and Functions will be must reading for anyone, professional or non-professional, who needs or wants to learn more about birds.
RECOMMENDATION: This set of books is a MUST-HAVE for anyone with a serious interest in bird biology!
2) Anderson, Dorian. Chelsea Green. Paperback: 256 pages. Price: $24.95 U.S.
PUBLISHER’S SUMMARY: At a personal and professional crossroads, a man resets his life and finds sobriety, love, and 618 bird species, cycling his way to a very Big Year.
In Birding Under the Influence, Dorian Anderson, a neuroscience researcher on a pressure-filled life trajectory, walks away from the world of elite institutions, research labs, and academic publishing. In doing so, he falls in love and discovers he has freed himself to embrace his lifelong passion for birding.
A North American Big Year―a continent-spanning adventure in which a birder attempts to see as many species as possible in twelve months―is a massive undertaking under any circumstances. But doing it on a bike while maintaining sobriety? That’s next level.
As Dorian pedals across the country, describing the birds he sees, he confronts the challenges of long-distance cycling: treacherous weather, punctured tires, speeding cars, and injury. He encounters eccentric characters, blistering blacktop, dreary hotel rooms, snarling dogs, and an endless sea of smoking tailpipes. He also confronts his past struggles with alcohol, drugs, and risky behaviors that began in high school and followed him into adulthood.
Birding Under the Influence is a candid, honest look at Dorian’s double life of academic accomplishment and addiction. While his journey to recovery is simultaneously poignant and inspiring, it is ultimately his love of birds and nature that provides the scaffolding to build a new and radically different life.
RECOMMENDATION: A must-read for anyone with an interest in Big Year narratives!
3) Bardet, Nathalie et al.. 29.95 U.S.
PUBLISHER’S SUMMARY: During the Mesozoic era, 252 to 66 million years ago, dinosaurs ruled the land, but the ocean deeps were roiling with equally spectacular reptiles―including giant predators. This richly illustrated, authoritative, and accessible book introduces readers to the world of these fascinating marine animals, whose predecessors returned to the seas a few million years after the first vertebrates emerged from the water. As we meet ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, mosasaurs, and many others, we learn about the astonishing anatomical, physiological, and behavioral adaptations that enabled these reptiles to become ocean dwellers again. We also learn about their living descendants, including sea turtles and sea snakes. Featuring stunning artwork depicting these prehistoric ocean creatures and photographs of their fossil remains, this book invites readers to discover the enthralling past of marine reptiles in all their extraordinary diversity.
RECOMMENDATION: A must-have for anyone with an interest in extinct marine reptiles.
4) Benton, Michael J.. 35.00 U.S.
PUBLISHER’S SUMMARY: A stunningly illustrated guide to these extraordinary creatures from a world-renowned paleontologist.
Paleobiology
has advanced from a speculative subject to a cutting-edge science.
Today, researchers are applying the latest forensic technologies to the
fossil record, revealing startling new insights into the lives of
dinosaurs. This illustrated guide explores the behavior, evolution,
physiology, and extinction of dinosaurs, taking readers inside the
mysterious world of these marvelous animals. With specially commissioned
illustrations by Bob Nicholls, Dinosaur Behavior explains how the dinosaurs lived and courted, fought and fed, signaled and interacted with each other, and much more.
How to Care about Animals
is a fascinating menagerie of passages from classical literature about
animals and the lives we share with them. Drawing on ancient writers
from Aesop to Ovid, classicist and farmer M. D. Usher has gathered a
healthy litter of selections that reveal some of the ways Greeks and
Romans thought about everything from lions, bears, and wolves to birds,
octopuses, and snails―and that might inspire us to rethink our own
relationships with our fellow creatures. Presented in lively new
translations, with the original texts on facing pages, these pieces are
filled with surprises―anticipating but also offering new perspectives on
many of our current feelings and ideas about animals.
Here,
Porphyry makes a compelling argument for vegetarianism and asserts that
the just treatment of animals makes us better people; Pliny the Elder
praises the virtuosity of songbirds and the virtuousness of elephants;
Plutarch has one of Circe’s pigs from the Odyssey make
a serio-comic case for the dignity of the beasts of the field;
Aristotle puts the study of animals on par with anthropology; we read
timeless Aesopian fables, including “The Hen That Laid the Golden Egg”
and “The Fox and the Grapes”; and there is much, much more.
A Noah’s Ark of a book, How to Care about Animals is guaranteed to charm and inspire anyone who loves animals.
RECOMMENDATION: An interesting little book that should be of interest to classicists and/or animal lovers.
6) Harrow, Alix E.. Tor Books. Hardbound: 308 pages. Price: $28.99 U.S.
PUBLISHER’S SUMMARY: Opal is a lot of things―orphan, high school dropout, full-time
cynic and part-time cashier―but above all, she's determined to find a
better life for her younger brother Jasper. One that gets them out of
Eden, Kentucky, a town remarkable for only two things: bad luck and E.
Starling, the reclusive nineteenth century author of The Underland, who disappeared over a hundred years ago. All she left behind were dark rumors―and her home. Everyone agrees that
it’s best to ignore the uncanny mansion and its misanthropic heir,
Arthur. Almost everyone, anyway. Opal has been obsessed with The Underland
since she was a child. When she gets the chance to step inside Starling
House―and make some extra cash for her brother's escape fund―she can't
resist.
But sinister forces are digging deeper into the buried
secrets of Starling House, and Arthur’s own nightmares have become far
too real. As Eden itself seems to be drowning in its own ghosts, Opal
realizes that she might finally have found a reason to stick around. And now she’ll have to fight.
Welcome to Starling House: enter, if you dare.
RECOMMENDATION: Fans of the author's other books should enjoy this one.
7) Evison, Jonathan. Dutton. Hardbound: 318 pages. Price: $28.00 U.S.
PUBLISHER’S SUMMARY: From one of America’s greatest, most creative novelists comes Again and Again, a poignant and endlessly surprising story about love lost, found, and redeemed
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