Nature and Science
June 2025

Recent Releases
Is a River Alive?
by Robert Macfarlane

The best-selling author of Underland explores the concept of rivers as living entities, weaving together travel writing, natural history and reporting from Ecuador, India and Canada to illuminate the interconnectedness of humans and rivers. 
Everything is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection
by John Green

The author tells the story of Henry, a young tuberculosis patient at Lakka Government Hospital in Sierra Leone, sharing the scientific and social histories of tuberculosis, the world's deadliest disease, and how humanity's choices can shape the disease's future.
Digging Into Nature: Outdoor Adventures for Happier and Healthier Kids
by Pooja Sarin Tandon

Pediatricians and nature experts Pooja Sarin Tandon and Danette Swanson Glassy make the convincing case that children and families will be happier, healthier, and more resilient when they spend time in nature. They offer a wealth of suggestions for nature-based activities and suggestions for overcoming common challenges busy families face when trying to increase their outdoor time. The authors address the importance of nature for children' s health at every age from infancy through adolescence and link their suggested activities to key developmental milestones. Digging Into Nature takes an inclusive approach, providing practical tips for parents of children with special health care needs, chronic health conditions, and cultural considerations to help all children reap the gifts that the great outdoors offer.
Everyday Intuition: What Psychology, Science, and Psychics Can Teach Us About Finding and Trusting Our Inner Voice
by Elizabeth Greenwood

We rely on our intuition, even though we don't fully understand what it is, how it works, or if we can even trust it. In this fresh, mind-opening book, Elizabeth Greenwood takes us on a sweeping investigation into the subject, exploring how, in our data-driven world, we can harness intuition in our day-to-day lives. Digging deep into her personal experience as well as insights from neuroscience, psychology, feminist texts, psychics, and everyday people with extraordinary intuitive ability, Greenwood explores what we know about intuition--how to distinguish it from instinct, wishful thinking, anxiety, and denial; how it serves and sometimes fails us; how it impacts our dreams and unconscious behavior; and how it manifests in everything from romantic attraction to premonitions. Greenwood places a special emphasis on "women's intuition," and how it has been denigrated throughout history--but can offer us a more hopeful, grounded way of experiencing the world in a time of so much uncertainty.
Valley of Forgetting: Alzheimer's Families and the Search for a Cure
by Jennie Erin Smith

While researchers had long been aware of the alarmingly high rates of early-onset Alzheimer’s in one remote region of Colombia, the discovery that many of the patients were related sparked the search for a genetic cause. Journalist Jennie Erin Smith tells the moving story of how an inherited gene was eventually isolated, igniting hope for a cure. For other emotional narratives about genetics and disease, try My Father’s Brain by Sandeep Jauhar or A Fatal Inheritance by Lawrence Ingrassia.
The Lost Trees of Willow Avenue: A Story of Climate and Hope on One American Street
by Mike Tidwell

Travel writer Mike Tidwell examines the impacts of climate change in his own Maryland suburb. Telling the story through interactions with his neighbors, all of whom had a stake in the die-off of their street’s stately old oaks, Tidwell inspires while sharing various neighborhood responses to problems both local and global. Other accessible reads about climate threats and activism include Adventures in the Anthropocene by Gaia Vince and California Against the Sea by Rosanna Xia.
Animal Communication
Eavesdropping on Animals: What We Can Learn from Wildlife Conversations
by George Bumann

George Bumann, an observant Yellowstone wildlife ecologist and artist, encourages us to listen in on the lively chatter among animals that we might usually tune out. With enthusiastic guidance that can apply to backyards as well as national parks and runs from birds to insects to coyotes, Bumann reminds us that a big part of nature appreciation is paying attention. Try this next: Meet the Neighbors by Brandon Keim.
The Hidden Language of Cats: How They Have Us at Meow
by Sarah L. Brown

Drawing on 30 years of experience, a renowned cat behavior scientist references historical records and examines modern scientific studies of cat-human communication to reveal previously unexplored secrets of how cats all over the world have learned to talk to us. 
Why Animals Talk: The New Science of Animal Communication
by Arik Kershenbaum

University of Cambridge zoologist Arik Kershenbaum has been in the field of animal communication for decades. His study of the speech-like sounds and songs emitted by creatures including wolves, parrots, dolphins, and chimpanzees runs afoul of the idea that humans are Earth’s sole language users, and posits that “animals have much to say to each other -- but also to us” (Kirkus Reviews).
Horse Speak: The Equine-Human Translation Guide: Conversations with Horses in Their Language
by Sharon Wilsie

This book is Wilsie's translation guide to the kinesthetic language of the horse. In it, she systematically teaches us how to have conversations with horses, not in our language of words and ropes, but in their language of the body.
Contact your librarian for more great books!