Staff Picks

This witty, well-written book explores how beavers and their decimation drastically altered the landscape of the American continent and what folks are doing to bring them back. Eager made me laugh, cry, and look at our environment in a whole new way. Now I can't stop thinking about beavers!

 

Publisher's description:

Environmental journalist Ben Goldfarb reveals that our modern idea of what a healthy landscape looks like and how it functions is wrong, distorted by the fur trade that once trapped out millions of beavers from North America’s lakes and rivers. The consequences of losing beavers were profound: streams eroded, wetlands dried up, and species from salmon to swans lost vital habitat. Today, a growing coalition of “Beaver Believers”—including scientists, ranchers, and passionate citizens—recognizes that ecosystems with beavers are far healthier, for humans and non-humans alike, than those without them. From the Nevada deserts to the Scottish highlands, Believers are now hard at work restoring these industrious rodents to their former haunts. This is a powerful story about one of the world’s most influential species, how North America was colonized, how our landscapes have changed over the centuries, and how beavers can help us fight drought, flooding, wildfire, extinction, and the ravages of climate change. Ultimately, it’s about how we can learn to coexist, harmoniously and even beneficially, with our fellow travelers on this planet.

 

Kids get to pilot a thrilling undersea STEM expedition in this choose-your-own-adventure-style nonfiction for young readers. Innovative, inclusive, and brimming with fascinating facts about squid and the various scientists that study them, this is a terrific pick for elementary school science lovers as well as kids who struggle to connect with traditional reading. 

 

Publisher's description:

An exciting ocean-themed choose-your-path STEM adventure for emerging readers! Take a journey to the ocean's twilight zone in Search for a Giant Squid ! An exciting mixture of action and non action, this choose-your-own-adventure-style story allows readers to take on the mantle of a teuthologist looking for a giant squid in its natural habitat. Once readers pick their submersible, pilot, and dive site, the adventure begins!

 

Before It's Gone is an honest look at the climate disasters we face today and eventually tomorrow, told from the perspective of a reporter who has covered disasters such as the Paradise Fires. Vigliotti examines the role the news media plays in covering disasters while informing other areas of high risk how to prepare and respond, while at the same time trying to navigate how to support the communities of the current disaster they are covering.

 

Publisher's description:
Before It's Gone traces Vigliotti's travels across the country, taking him to the frontlines of climate disaster and revealing the genuine impacts of climate change that countless Americans have already been forced to confront. From massive forest fires in California to hurricanes in Louisiana, receding coastlines in Massachusetts and devastated fisheries in Alaska, we learn that warnings of a future impacted by climate are no more; the climate catastrophe is already here. This is the story of America, and Americans, on the edge, and a powerful argument that radical action on climate change with a respect for its people and traditions is not only possible, but also the only way to preserve what we love.

 

This book really opened my eyes to the ethical complications that can arise when pursuing genetic testing as a genealogical hobby. The author describes the interesting history of genealogy. She interviews many DNA testers who walk away with more questions than answers about family and heritage.

 

Publisher's description:
A deeply reported look at the rise of home genetic testing and the seismic shock it has had on individual lives You swab your cheek or spit into a vial, then send it away to a lab somewhere. Weeks later you get a report that might tell you where your ancestors came from or if you carry certain genetic risks. Or the report could reveal a long-buried family secret and upend your entire sense of identity. Soon a lark becomes an obsession, an incessant desire to find answers to questions at the core of your being, like “Who am I?” and “Where did I come from?” Welcome to the age of home genetic testing. In The Lost Family, journalist Libby Copeland investigates what happens when we embark on a vast social experiment with little understanding of the ramifications. Copeland explores the culture of genealogy buffs, the science of DNA, and the business of companies like Ancestry and 23andMe, all while tracing the story of one woman, her unusual results, and a relentless methodical drive for answers that becomes a thoroughly modern genetic detective story. The Lost Family delves into the many lives that have been irrevocably changed by home DNA tests—a technology that represents the end of family secrets. There are the adoptees who’ve used the tests to find their birth parents; donor-conceived adults who suddenly discover they have more than fifty siblings; hundreds of thousands of Americans who discover their fathers aren’t biologically related to them, a phenomenon so common it is known as a “non-paternity event”; and individuals who are left to grapple with their conceptions of race and ethnicity when their true ancestral histories are discovered. Throughout these accounts, Copeland explores the impulse toward genetic essentialism and raises the question of how much our genes should get to tell us about who we are. With more than thirty million people having undergone home DNA testing, the answer to that question is more important than ever. Gripping and masterfully told, The Lost Family is a spectacular book on a big, timely subject.

Find The Lost Family in our catalog

I have read and recommended to others this instructive creative non-fiction book. The illustrations are in layman's rather than overly technical terms.

 

Publisher's description: What was the first message sent over the internet? How much water does a single person use every day? How was the electric light invented? For every utility people use each day, there's a hidden history below the surface -- a story of intrigue, drama, humor, and inequity. This graphic novel provides a guided tour through the science of the past -- and how the decisions people made while inventing and constructing early technology still affect the way people use it today. Full of art, maps, and diagrams, Hidden Systems is a thoughtful, humorous exploration of the history of science, and what needs to be done now to change the future.

 

The author, an infectious disease doctor, does a masterful job presenting the harm caused by ultra-processed foods (UPFs) to our physical and mental health, as well as the environment. This book motivated me to change my diet and see the need for marketing restrictions and warning labels on UPFs.

 

Publisher's description:

A manifesto to change how you eat and how you think about the human body.

It’s not you, it’s the food.

In a fast-paced and eye-opening narrative van Tulleken explores the origins, science, and economics of Ultra-Processed Food to reveal its catastrophic impact on our bodies and the planet. And he proposes real solutions for doctors, for policy makers, and for all of us who have to eat. A book that won’t only upend the way you shop and eat, Ultra-Processed People will open your eyes to the need for action on a global scale.

 

This book protests against the widespread use of chemical pesticides, herbicides, and insecticides in the U.S because of the harm that such chemicals do to the environment and to humans. By giving many examples of the inefficacy of chemical pest control and of human death resulting from poisoning via chemical sprays, Carson makes it abundantly clear that using chemicals to tamper with nature upsets the delicate balance of life and causes a backlash. For example, chemical insecticide sprays kill not only the target insect but also its natural predators, allowing surviving target insects to thrive without restrictions. Chemical sprays also contain poisons like arsenic, which build up in miniscule amounts in the body and cause untimely death in humans. By bringing this fatal reality of chemical sprays close to us, Carson evokes fear in us and effectively turns us against chemical sprays. Her statements in this all-revealing book teach us the importance of knowing the consequences before we take action. 

- Jikyu K., eighth-grade teen volunteer

Publisher's description:

Discusses the reckless annihilation of fish and birds by the use of pesticides and warns of the possible genetic effects on humans.
 

Don't believe what those male scientists have been telling us about the fairer sex. There are some really tough cookies and oddball behaviors out there, like the baby-killer meerkats, slutty ducks, and sperm-saving lobsters. Informative and hilarious, this book is for fans of Mary Roach.

 

Publisher's description: 

Studying zoology made Lucy Cooke feel like a sad freak. Not because she loved spiders or would root around in animal feces: all her friends shared the same curious kinks. The problem was her sex. Being female meant she was, by nature, a loser. Since Charles Darwin, evolutionary biologists have been convinced that the males of the animal kingdom are the interesting ones—dominating and promiscuous, while females are dull, passive, and devoted. In this book, Cooke tells a new story. Whether investigating same-sex female albatross couples that raise chicks, murderous mother meerkats, or the titanic battle of the sexes waged by ducks, Cooke shows us a new evolutionary biology, one where females can be as dynamic as any male. This isn‘t your grandfather’s evolutionary biology. It’s more inclusive, truer to life, and, simply, more fun.

Find Bitch: On the Female of the Species

If you enjoy watching the interactions of bugs in your backyard, this book is for you. This fascinating natural history of the world's 20,000 types of bees is beautifully told.

 

Publisher's description:

From the award-winning author of The Triumph of Seeds and Feathers comes a natural and cultural history of the buzzing beasties that make the world go round.  A conservation biologist presents a natural and cultural history of the bee that traces its evolution and varieties while evaluating the environmental hazards placing them at risk.