Book picks similar to
A Natural History Of Australia by Tim M. Berra
oceania
paleo-evolution
australia
college
When the Rivers Run Dry: Water - The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century
Fred Pearce - 2006
Deftly weaving together the complicated scientific, economic, and historic dimensions of the world water crisis, he provides our most complete portrait yet of this growing danger and its ramifications for us all. Named as one of the Top 50 Sustainability Books by University of Cambridges Programme for Sustainability Leadership and Greenleaf Publishing.
The Age of Sustainable Development
Jeffrey D. Sachs - 2015
Sachs is one of the world's most perceptive and original analysts of global development. In this major new work he presents a compelling and practical framework for how global citizens can use a holistic way forward to address the seemingly intractable worldwide problems of persistent extreme poverty, environmental degradation, and political-economic injustice: sustainable development.Sachs offers readers, students, activists, environmentalists, and policy makers the tools, metrics, and practical pathways they need to achieve Sustainable Development Goals. Far more than a rhetorical exercise, this book is designed to inform, inspire, and spur action. Based on Sachs's twelve years as director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, his thirteen years advising the United Nations secretary-general on the Millennium Development Goals, and his recent presentation of these ideas in a popular online course, "The Age of Sustainable Development" is a landmark publication and clarion call for all who care about our planet and global justice.
Bluewater Walkabout: Into Africa, Finding Healing Through Trauma
Tina Dreffin - 2016
But when her sons bring along two friends who upset the family balance, rogue waves and large sharks threaten the family’s safety. When Tina begins to deal with a mysterious health problem, the perils of life at sea become very real.The book begins with an adventurous safari through Africa, during which Tina reflects on the challenges that a life lived differently can bring. Half running from an early adulthood fraught with sexual trauma, and half running towards a dream, Tina met her husband and the two of them decided to live a life at sea.This story is candid, moving, heartfelt and beautifully written. What sets it aside from other sailing memoirs is that it is about so much more than the journey. Tina writes about topics such as mental illness, sexual assault, the loss of a child, and the challenges of motherhood. These are naturally woven into the narrative, creating a layer of complexity and strength, making it enjoyable to those who have been to sea and those who haven’t.
Ten Feet Tall and Not Quite Bulletproof
Cameron Hardiman - 2020
Every morning he put on a navy blue police flight suit, grabbed his flight helmet, and prepared to work on the police helicopter. He could be called to anything during a shift, to search for a missing child, to pull an injured driver from a wrecked car, or a dangerous sea rescue. He saw his fair share of trauma and dealt with it like most coppers would: he quickly put each dangerous job out of his mind as soon as it was over. But one particular rescue job in Bass Strait brought about a reckoning - and Cameron was never the same again.This is the brilliantly told, white-knuckle story of one cop learning every lesson the hard way - and coming to find out that being not quite bulletproof doesn't mean that you're not a good cop.
Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature
William Cronon - 1995
Among the ironies and entanglements resulting from this goal are the sale of nature in our malls through the Nature Company, and the disputes between working people and environmentalists over spotted owls and other objects of species preservation.The problem is that we haven't learned to live responsibly in nature. The environmentalist aim of legislating humans out of the wilderness is no solution. People, Cronon argues, are inextricably tied to nature, whether they live in cities or countryside. Rather than attempt to exclude humans, environmental advocates should help us learn to live in some sustainable relationship with nature. It is our home.
Secrets From The Dust
George Hamilton - 2010
She stubbornly fights to maintain her culture until she can escape or her real parents find her. But soon she discovers that she is growing to like many of the customs and material possessions of her captors, throwing her into an identity crisis, which rips another fault line through her world.By the time she grows into a beautiful young woman, she has already suffered the disappointments of unrequited love and a forbidden desire. Encouraged to hide behind the identity of a Southern European, the highly charged political environment of the time, and her love for a political activist, forces her to confront her true identity.
Wisdom Sits in Places: Landscape and Language Among the Western Apache
Keith H. Basso - 1996
Apache conceptions of wisdom, manners and morals, and of their own history are inextricably intertwined with place, and by allowing us to overhear his conversations with Apaches on these subjects Basso expands our awareness of what place can mean to people.Most of us use the term "sense of place" often and rather carelessly when we think of nature or home or literature. Our senses of place, however, come not only from our individual experiences but also from our cultures. "Wisdom Sits in Places," the first sustained study of places and place-names by an anthropologist, explores place, places, and what they mean to a particular group of people, the Western Apache in Arizona. For more than thirty years, Keith Basso has been doing fieldwork among the Western Apache, and now he shares with us what he has learned of Apache place-names--where they come from and what they mean to Apaches."This is indeed a brilliant exposition of landscape and language in the world of the Western Apache. But it is more than that. Keith Basso gives us to understand something about the sacred and indivisible nature of words and place. And this is a universal equation, a balance in the universe. Place may be the first of all concepts; it may be the oldest of all words."--N. Scott Momaday"In "Wisdom Sits in Places" Keith Basso lifts a veil on the most elemental poetry of human experience, which is the naming of the world. In so doing he invests his scholarship with that rarest of scholarly qualities: a sense of spiritual exploration. Through his clear eyes we glimpse the spirit of a remarkable people and their land, and when we look away, we see our own world afresh."--William deBuys"A very exciting book--authoritative, fully informed, extremely thoughtful, and also engagingly written and a joy to read. Guiding us vividly among the landscapes and related story-tellings of the Western Apache, Basso explores in a highly readable way the role of language in the complex but compelling theme of a people's attachment to place. An important book by an eminent scholar."--Alvin M. Josephy, Jr.
The Fatal Impact
Alan Moorehead - 1966
As acknowledged, he's drawn heavily on the historian J.C. Beaglehole's definitive volumes, as well as from other weighty sources. But this should not dismay the layman. He has the novelist's eye, not only in his firm but sensuous descriptions, but also in his stunning ability to evoke character, interweave various tales, & see a Jumble of facts & conjectures as a means of releasing whatever dramatic moments are around. The confrontation between aggressive Europeans & innocent primitive tribes affords ample opportunity. The book is a requiem for an idyllic past, moving in its picture of a wild civilization slowly eroding under the impact of commercial progress or geographical expansion, exciting in its interplay of differing psychological attitudes or customs, & developed with many crisscrossing references: Bougainville & Banks, Melville & Gauguin, the Bounty mutiny & the little known efforts of the Englishwoman Daisy Bates to save the Aborigines. A lovely, sophisticated work.--Kirkus (edited)
The Conquest of Nature: Water, Landscape, and the Making of Modern Germany
David Blackbourn - 2006
His account, in which he shows how Germans set out to "conquer" that most fundamental natural element, water, brings together politics, culture, economics, and ecology in a daring work of total history.
Biology [With MasteringBiology]
Neil A. Campbell - 2007
The book's hallmark values-accuracy, currency, and passion for teaching and learning-have made Campbell/Reece the most successful book for readers for seven consecutive editions. More than 6 million readers have benefited from "BIOLOGY's"clear explanations, carefully crafted artwork, and student-friendly narrative style.Introduction: Themes in the Study of Life, The Chemical Context of Life, Water and the Fitness of the Environment, Carbon and the Molecular Diversity of Life, The Structure and Function of Large Biological Molecules, A Tour of the Cell, Membrane Structure and Function, An Introduction to Metabolism, Cellular Respiration: Harvesting Chemical Energy, Photosynthesis, Cell Communication, The Cell Cycle, Meiosis and Sexual Life Cycles, Mendel and the Gene Idea, The Chromosomal Basis of Inheritance, The Molecular Basis of Inheritance, From Gene to Protein, Control of Gene Expression, Viruses, Biotechnology, Genomes and Their Evolution, Descent with Modification: A Darwinian View of Life, The Evolution of Populations, The Origin of Species, The History of Life on Earth, Phylogeny and the Tree of Life, Bacteria and Archaea, Protists, Plant Diversity I: How Plants Colonized Land, Plant Diversity II: The Evolution of Seed Plants, Fungi, An Introduction to Animal Diversity, Invertebrates, Vertebrates, Plant Structure, Growth, and Development, Transport in Vascular Plants, Soil and Plant Nutrition, Angiosperm Reproduction and Biotechnology, Plant Responses to Internal and External Signals, Basic Principles of Animal Form and Function, Animal Nutrition, Circulation and Gas Exchange, The Immune System, Osmoregulation and Excretion, Hormones and the Endocrine System, Animal Reproduction, Animal Development, Neurons, Synapses, and Signaling, Nervous Systems, Sensory and Motor Mechanisms, Animal Behavior, An Introduction to Ecology and the Biosphere, Population Ecology, Community Ecology, Ecosystems, Conservation Biology and Restoration Ecology.For readers interested in learning the basics of Biology.
Long Shots: Jay Wright, Villanova, and College Basketball’s Most Unlikely Champion
Dana O'Neil - 2017
The shot and second national title in school history were the culmination of 15 years of Coach Jay Wright painstakingly building the unheralded program, through ups and downs, heartbreak and triumph. In Long Shots: Jay Wright, Villanova, and College Basketball’s Most Unlikely Champion, ESPN senior writer Dana O’Neil uses exclusive access to Coach Wright and Nova basketball to delve into the inner-workings of a championship program. In the spirit of A Season on the Brink, O’Neil not only explores behind-the-scenes of the historic 2015-2016 NCAA championship season but also the improbable path that the Nova program took to college basketball immortality. In overcoming a disappointing NCAA Tournament track record, the breakup of the Big East conference as we knew it, and Nova’s underdog status among traditional college hoops powerhouses, Jay Wright and his team provided the blueprint for how a “have-not” can prevail over the blue bloods the right way – the Villanova Basketball Way.
Curious and Curiouser
Karl Kruszelnicki - 2010
Are cooked mussels safe ONLY if they are open?Why does alcohol make the opposite sex more attractive?Why does washing your hands ease your conscience, make it easier to live with hard decisions, and make you more tolerant?Why does lightning strike the same place twice (and more)?Do babies get more illnesses when they are "teething"?What is the science behind people spontaneously bursting into flame?And what's more hygienic - an air blower or a paper towel?
Flight Ways: Life and Loss at the Edge of Extinction
Thom van Dooren - 2014
Unlike other meditations on the subject, Flight Ways incorporates the particularities of real animals and their worlds, drawing philosophers, natural scientists, and general readers into the experience of living among and losing biodiversity.Each chapter of Flight Ways focuses on a different species or group of birds: North Pacific albatrosses, Indian vultures, an endangered colony of penguins in Australia, Hawaiian crows, and the iconic whooping cranes of North America. Written in eloquent and moving prose, the book takes stock of what is lost when a life form disappears from the world--the wide-ranging ramifications that ripple out to implicate a number of human and more-than-human others. Van Dooren intimately explores what life is like for those who must live on the edge of extinction, balanced between life and oblivion, taking care of their young and grieving their dead. He bolsters his studies with real-life accounts from scientists and local communities at the forefront of these developments. No longer abstract entities with Latin names, these species become fully realized characters enmeshed in complex and precarious ways of life, sparking our sense of curiosity, concern, and accountability toward others in a rapidly changing world.
A Neotropical Companion: An Introduction to the Animals, Plants, and Ecosystems of the New World Tropics
John C. Kricher - 1989
It is the most comprehensive one-volume guide to the Neotropics available today. Widely praised in its first edition, it remains a book of unparalleled value to tourists, students, and scientists alike. This second edition has been substantially revised and expanded to incorporate the abundance of new scientific information that has been produced since it was first published in 1989. Major additions have been made to every chapter, and new chapters have been added on Neotropical ecosystems, human ecology, and the effects of deforestation. Biodiversity and its preservation are discussed throughout the book, and Neotropical evolution is described in detail. This new edition offers all new drawings and photographs, many of them in color. As enthusiastic readers of the first edition will attest, this is a charming book. Wearing his learning lightly and writing with ease and humor, John Kricher presents the complexities of tropical ecology as accessible and nonintimidating. Kricher is so thoroughly knowledgeable and the book is so complete in its coverage that general readers and ecotourists will not need any other book to help them identify and understand the plants and animals, from birds to bugs, that they will encounter in their travels to the New World tropics. At the same time, it will fascinate armchair travelers and students who may get no closer to the Neotropics than this engagingly written book.
Don't Eat the Puffin: Tales From a Travel Writer's Life
Jules Brown - 2018
Get paid to travel and write about it.Only no one told Jules that it would mean eating oily seabirds, repeatedly falling off a husky sled, getting stranded on a Mediterranean island, and crash-landing in Iran.The exotic destinations come thick and fast – Hong Kong, Hawaii, Huddersfield – as Jules navigates what it means to be a travel writer in a world with endless surprises up its sleeve.Add in a cast of larger-than-life characters – Elvis, Captain Cook, his own travel-mad Dad – and an eye for the ridiculous, and this journey with Jules is one you won’t want to miss.