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Wondering what the ultimate solution is to supplementing your love of nature with knowledge? Well, there are nature documentaries, magazines, email newsletters from reputable organisations . . . All sorts. But, my favoured means of gaining knowledge about nature and wildlife is by immersing myself into the pages of a book.
I am a book lover, perhaps as much as I am a nature lover; my shelves are straining under the ever increasing collection of literary loveliness. And, alongside all the biographies, travel writing, fiction, and non-fiction, there are the nature books. But, one can always have more . . .
So, in today's post, I am going to run through five nature books on my wishlist . . .
1. Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake
This prize-winning book on fungi has been on my horizon for a while now.
In this book, Merlin Sheldrake demonstrates the impressive abilities of fungi, their importance to life on earth, and just how integral they have been to human history and progress.
With fungi being one of those life forms in the natural world that I could learn much more about, and with the great reviews this book has received, this work sits comfortably somewhere at the top of my bookish wishlist!
You can buy Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake here.
2. Around the World in 80 Plants by Jonathan Drori, Illustrated by Lucille Clerc
When I was younger, my interest in nature was mostly concerned with the apparently much more dynamic animal life, and it wasn't until I got a little older and a little wiser that my interest began to encompass an interest in the equally fascinating plant life with which we share space on this planet. So, I am playing catch up, and am happy to find any good book on plants.
And this book looks like a really, really good book!
The author takes a trip around the world, and takes a look at eighty plants from across the globe. As well as looking at the life science of these plants, Drori explores how they are entwined with human history, culture, and folklore.
You can purchase Around the World in 80 Plants by Jonathan Drori and Lucille Clerc here.
3. Do Earth: Healing Strategies for Humankind by Tamsin Omond
Tamsin Omond has spent over a decade in climate activism, and she has discovered that the crisis this planet faces is bigger than any one group of activists can tackle. It needs all of us. And so, she penned this work, taking a look at the ways in which humanity can heal its relationship with nature, and therefore help the planet to heal.
I see the broken relationship, when I take myself off walking, and I stop amongst trees, sitting on a log beside a stream, hoping for some Wordsworth scene of natural beauty, but instead find polystyrene, plastics, and aluminium floating on the water and the breeze. We all see it when leaders speak of the need for more trees, but then advocate for the destruction of ancient woodland so that some building, train line, road . . . can take its place.
With a love for nature must come a desire to see its health and wellbeing supported and sustained. After all, if you need further reasoning, we are a product of nature, and what happens to it will eventually come back to us.
You can purchase Do Earth by Tamsin Omond here.
4. Julia and the Shark by Kiran Millwood Hargrave, Tom de Freston
A children's novel that Waterstones describes as "an exquisite reflection on family, science and the fragile yet sublime beauty of the environment."
If a novel can introduce children to the wonder of nature, the environment, and the sciences with which we discover more about our world, then that's worth a look, in my opinion.
Inspired by an article about a 400-year-old Greenland shark and themes of parental mental health, thrown into the spotlight particularly by the pandemic and lockdowns, this book was written by prize-winning author Kiran Millwood Hargrave, and illustrated by artist, and the author's husband, Tom de Freston.
You can purchase Julia and the Shark by Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston here.
5. Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
As a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation and a botanist, as the cover of this book points out, Kimmerer brings understanding of both indigenous wisdom and scientific knowledge in this exploration of plant life and its wider ecological reach.
As with many of the best, in my opinion, books on nature, this is a celebration of the living world, and an advocate for understanding it more, so that it might thrive.
As with Do Earth, this book suggests that we can embrace lessons from our natural world, and reestablish a good relationship with the world, and that we must learn to hear again lessons that the living world has to teach us.
You can purchase Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer here.
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