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Staff Pick
The Wood for the Trees is an expansive, richly layered biography of… four acres of woodland. Begun as a diary kept by distinguished paleontologist Richard Fortey, it grew into a loving investigation of the flora, fauna, weather, geology, and history of one tiny portion of our sacred, endangered natural world. Recommended By Gigi L., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
From the author of Earth: An Intimate History, an exuberant "biography" of four acres of woodland, evoking a cosmos of living and inanimate things and imagining its millennia of existence.
A few years ago, award-winning scientist Richard Fortey purchased four acres of woodland in the Chiltern Hills of Oxfordshire, England. The Wood for the Trees is the joyful, lyrical portrait of what he found there.
With one chapter for each month, we move through the seasons: tree felling in January, moth hunting in June, finding golden mushrooms in September. Fortey, along with the occasional expert friend, investigates the forest top to bottom, discovering a new species and explaining the myriad connections that tie us to nature and nature to itself. His textured, evocative prose and gentle humor illuminate the epic story of a small forest. But he doesn't stop at mere observation. The Wood for the Trees uses the forest as a springboard back through time, full of rich and unexpected tales of the people, plants, and animals that once called the land home. With Fortey's help, we come to see a universe in miniature.
Review
"What [Fortey] shows in this remarkable book, always precise, often lyrical, sometimes prickly, however, is just how much can be learned, how much gained by sinking deep into one particular place." The Standard (UK)
Review
"Deeply knowledgable, enthusiastic.... Fortey illuminates its flora and fauna, history and geology with indisputable expertise." Financial Times
Review
"[Fortey's] remarkable scientific knowledge, intense curiosity and love of nature mean entries erupt with the same richness and variety as the woods they describe.... Fortey's enthusiasm for his new wonderland is infectious and illuminating." The Guardian
Review
"Fascinating…vivid…striking…an immensely detailed portrait of the flora and fauna contained in four acres…Fortey creates an astounding portrait of multilayered life in one relatively restricted space, reviving the great tradition of natural history…[and] conveys unforgettably the staggering variety and abundance of the whole natural world." Michael McCarthy, The New York Times Book Review
About the Author
Richard Fortey was a senior paleontologist at the Natural History Museum in London until his retirement in 2006. He is the author of several books, including Fossils: The Key to the Past; The Hidden Landscape, which won the Natural World Book of the Year in 1993; Life: A Natural History of Four Billion Years of Life on Earth; Trilobite!, which was short-listed for the Samuel Johnson Prize; Earth: An Intimate History; and Dry Storeroom No. 1: The Secret Life of the Natural History Museum. He has won the Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing About Science from Rockefeller University and the Michael Faraday Prize from the Royal Society. He was president of the Geological Society of London during its bicentennial year in 2007 and is a Fellow of both the Royal Society and the Royal Society of Literature. He lives in Oxfordshire.
Richard Fortey on PowellsBooks.Blog
For most of my working life, I occupied an office in London’s great Natural History Museum, tucked away from the gaze of the crowds, hidden away among the vast backroom collections. I am a paleontologist by trade, a researcher into ancient life, and an expert on a marvelous group of long-extinct animals: trilobites...
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