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Darwin considered humans one part of the web of life, not the apex of a natural hierarchy. Yet today many maintain that we are the most intelligent, virtuous, successful species that ever lived. This flawed thinking enables us to exploit the earth towards our own exclusive ends, throwing us into a perilous planetary imbalance. But is this view and way of life inevitable? The Arrogant Ape shows that human exceptionalism is an ideology that relies more on human culture than our biology, more on delusion and faith than on evidence.

One afternoon many years ago, James Rebanks met an old woman on a remote Norwegian island. She lived and worked alone on a tiny rocky outcrop, caring for wild Eider ducks and gathering their down. Hers was a centuries-old trade that had once made men and women rich but had long been in decline. Still, somehow, she seemed to be hanging on. Back at home, Rebanks couldn’t stop thinking about the woman on the rocks. She was fierce and otherworldly—and yet strangely familiar.

The fascinating and remarkable true story of the world’s first forensic ornithologist— Roxie Laybourne, who broke down barriers for women, solved murders, and investigated deadly airplane crashes with nothing more than a microscope and a few fragments of feathers.

Anthropomorphism is the human tendency to attribute human-like thoughts, feelings, and intentions to non-human things. It’s a cognitive bias baked into the human mind that distorts our view of the world. But it doesn’t just affect our understanding of animals. Anthropomorphism impacts our relationship to all living things, as well as inanimate objects (like AI), and natural phenomena (like hurricanes). It’s perhaps one of the most powerful cognitive biases influencing our thoughts, but it’s rarely talked about. It’s time to change that.

With nearly 1500 species, bats account for more than twenty percent of mammalian species. The most successful and most diverse group of mammals, bats come in different sizes, shapes, and colors, from the tiny bumblebee bat to the giant golden-crowned flying fox. Some bats eat fruit and nectar; others eat frogs, scorpions or fish. Vampire bats feed on blood. Bats are the only mammals that can fly; their fingers have elongated through evolution to become wings with a unique super-flexible skin membrane stretched between them.

As a child, Lulu Miller's scientist father taught her that chaos will come for us all. There is no cosmic destiny, no plan. Enter David Starr Jordan, 19th-century taxonomist and believer in order. A fish specialist devoted to mapping out the great tree of life, who spent his days pinning down unruly fins, studying shimmering scales and sealing new discoveries into jars of ethanol.

Evolutionary biologist Nathan H. Lents takes listeners on a journey from silent crickets to lesbian albatrosses to bonobos who kiss, revealing what this incredible array of sexual diversity can teach us about our own. Amusing, enlightening and meticulously researched, Lents convincingly shows that diverse genders and sexuality have evolutionary functions far beyond procreation. The Sexual Evolution is a perspective-altering book that advocates understanding and demolishes biases held by even the most open-minded among us.

From scorching deserts to frozen seabeds, from the highest peaks of the Himalaya to the hadal depths of the oceans, there are habitats on this Earth that appear inimical to life—yet in which it flourishes nevertheless. During the midday heat of the Sahara, silvery ants sprint from their nests to feed. In North American forests, wood frogs awaken each spring from solid blocks of ice. At the site of the Chernobyl disaster, fungi harness radiation to thrive.

Charles Hood is on a boat, wearing at least two life jackets as he scans the sky for seabirds and plumbs the depths of his—and our—relationship with the vast Pacific Ocean. Winner of the Foreword INDIES Book of the Year for his collection of essays A Salad Only the Devil Would Eat: The Joys of Ugly Nature, Hood now brings his irrepressible curiosity to the lives of petrels, frigate birds, sea snakes, and flying fish.

A shelter cat teaches us that our damaged parts, too, are worthy of love... a captive orca shows us that inconvenience and difficulties are the blessing of a full life... a gorilla teaches the universal language of grief... a group of oysters who prove that magic and science can and do coexist…

Nature Needs You tells the compelling story of how Hannah, without campaigning experience, funding or contacts, set out to save swifts from extinction in the UK. Her mission is to change the law and make ‘swift bricks’ mandatory so that the birds who nest in our walls will have a future in Britain.

When the sun has set, things get interesting with wild animals. Where people wait for buses during the day, a family of raccoons rummages through the trash can. Foxes and skunks search for food; fireflies send flashing signals to potential mates; owls and bats fly overhead. Night is not just a time, but a diverse habitat that we still know too little about. Wildlife biologist Sophia Kimmig is on the trail of the secrets of the night.

Reporter and birder Ryan Goldberg came to birding unexpectedly, but as many first timers do after seeing their “spark” bird, he fell hard. Enamored by the incredible variety of species that pass through his hometown of New York City, and with the other passionate birders he meets, he embarks on a year of reporting on the natural wonders hiding amidst the skyscrapers. He learns that millions of birds migrate through the five boroughs each year—at least 400 different species, way more than can be found in Yellowstone National Park.

This captivating book brings together two birds of a feather: Jean and Johnny, boys from very different worlds growing up in a small village in France. Jean is the genteel pharmacist’s son, dressed in his Sunday best; Johnny’s father is a rough, working-class sheep herder, always with the odor of animals clinging to him. Each year, over three hundred bird species visit their village, which intersects a major migratory flyway. The two boys’ stories converge when Jean enters a bird-calling contest.

In Nature's Genius David Farrier takes us on a profound journey into this ever-changing natural world. What we discover could change us. The ways animals adjust to the urban landscape can help us design sustainable cities. Examining other intelligences can help us remake our economies. Learning from bacterial evolution may help solve our waste problem. Synthetic biology could rescue animals from the brink of extinction. Thinking in timescales of the natural world could help us choose a better future.