An inspired weaving of indigenous knowledge, plant science, and personal narrative from a distinguished professor of science and a Native American whose previous book, Gathering Moss, was awarded the John Burroughs Medal for outstanding nature writing. As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she learned from elders,...

"It's the near future, and tens of thousands of species are going extinct every year. The loss is not total, though: the DNA sequences of many species are being digitized and uploaded to a global network of "biobanks," together with brain and body scans, recordings of behavior in the wild, microbiota profiles, and so forth, in the hope that the extinct victims of humanity's destructiveness might one day be resurrected. Then comes the day when the...

Focuses on the interactive relationship between living organisms and the inanimate physical aspects of the Earth.

Examines the effects of human behavior on Earth's ecosystems and the roles renewable energy, recycling, and wildlife protection have to play in the survival of our planet.

"An award-winning ecology writer goes looking for the wilderness we've forgotten. Many people believe that only an ecological catastrophe will change humanity's troubled relationship with the natural world. In fact, as J.B. MacKinnon argues in this unorthodox look at the disappearing wilderness, we are living in the midst of a disaster thousands of years in the making--and we hardly notice it. We have forgotten what nature can be and adapted to a...