Christopher J Preston, a professor of environmental philosophy at the University of Montana and author of Tenacious Beasts: Wildlife Recoveries That Change How We Think about Animals, selects from his library some of his favourite and formative reads…
• Fingers in the Sparkle Jar
by Chris Packham (2016)
A book written with the same vivid intensity that characterised Packham’s own struggles to find his path.
• The Living Mountain
by Nan Shepherd (2014)
I was almost asleep when I started to read this book, but by 20 pages in, the clarity of the writing had me bolt upright. Every paragraph has the definition of a shard
of Cairngorm ice.
• Eager
by Ben Goldfarb (2018)
Some animals need social rehabilitation. This entertaining and informative romp through the wetlands is a masterclass in how to do it for a rodent – the remarkable beaver.
• Fathoms
by Rebecca Giggs (2020)
It’s rare for whales to get what they deserve from our species, but Giggs’ fascinating and poetic natural history starts to pay back a portion of an impossible debt.
• Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs
by Alexandra Fuller (2001)
Fuller unspools a chronicle containing painful injustice and side-splitting family dynamics during the tumultuous years of her childhood. Colonialism, alcohol and the dignity of Africa spill from every line.
• The Man Who Quit Money
by Mark Sundeen (2012)
Of course, it can’t be done. Not today. Not in the consumer world that suffocates us. But it can. Sundeen shows it. His sensitive depiction of Daniel Suelo will shake any entrenched set of values.
• The Blue Bear
by Lynn Schooler (2003)
Schooler patiently unwraps the attractive magic of the blue (or glacier) bear. The intensity of his friendship with Japanese photographer Michio Hoshino evolves against the backdrop of coastal Alaska’s majesty and the elusiveness of the bear.
