RaveThe New York Times Book ReviewDavis...makes clear in his rollicking, poetic, wise new book that cultural and political history are an integral part of this natural history, not to be omitted if we want to tell the whole story ... Along with the famous humans, Davis never neglects the birds themselves ... Davis shines at most everything in this exuberantly expansive book, but especially at highlighting individual birds like the translocated ones making their way in the world. With eagle numbers now estimated at levels they were before \'America became America,\' their comeback is astonishing.
Mary Roach
PositiveThe New York Times Book ReviewThe author Mary Roach made her reputation for witty, quirky and sometimes gross science writing in a series of snappily titled books ... The book doesn’t come off as comprehensive, but it does make for an idiosyncratic tour with Roach as the wisecracking, ever-probing guide ... Roach delights in the disgusting details of science. For those of us with, ahem, a taste for scatological humor, she delivers the story of a gull in a crowded nesting area that managed to defecate directly into the mouth of a hooded student ... My favorite moments, ultimately, weren’t the funny ones, but those that reveal a bit of scientific poetry.
Frans de Waal
RaveThe Boston Globe\"[De Waal\'s] best book ... Though science has long resisted the idea that non-human animals share aspects of human traits, de Waal brilliantly builds his case that emotions are \'bodily expressed,\' therefore somewhat measurable, and that not only can we see that other creatures have emotional lives, but that they can help us understand what underlies our own ... [De Waal] uses his own research, some familiar from his other books, lots of it fresh, and weaves in thoughts from literature, art criticism, and a pile of work from others ... [De Waal\'s] book too may help reframe how we see animals and our place among them. Ultimately, the conversational tone isn’t just a style, but a key to understanding — these are complex notions, he seems to say, but just use your common sense.
Suzy Fincham-Gray
PositiveThe New York Times\"She doesn’t always deliver on the personal introspection she’s reaching for in this memoir, but elements like her short profile of the pancreas, which, in part, describes the organ as \'pale and malevolent, hiding between the smooth, jolly pink intestines and the dense, bloody liver,\' are memorably vivid.\
Charles Foster
PositiveThe New York Times Book Review...a meditative romp that leaves you laughing out loud (and occasionally cursing in anger) even as you soak up the spray of science ... Steeped in scholarship, yet directed by his own quirky mysticism, Foster brilliantly takes on questions of animal consciousness, cognition, emotion and theory of mind.
Helen Macdonald
RaveThe New York Times Book ReviewIn her breathtaking new book Helen Macdonald renders an indelible impression of a raptor’s fierce essence — and her own — with words that mimic feathers, so impossibly pretty we don’t notice their astonishing engineering.
