Wills shares with us some of the extraordinary sights he has seen, exploring each time the evolutionary processes that underlie the beauty and diversity of the wildlife.

In this magnificently illustrated book, Christopher Wills takes us on a series of adventures. From the underwater life of Indonesia's Lambeh Strait to a little valley in northern Israel, to an earthquake in the coral reef off the island of Yap and the dry valleys of western Mongolia, Wills demonstrates how ecology and evolution have interacted to yield the world we live in. Each chapter features a different location and brings out a different and important message. With the author's own stunning photographs of the wildlife he discovered on his travels, he draws out the evolutionary stories behind the wildlife and shows how our understanding of the living world can be deepened by a Darwinian perspective. Wills demonstrates how looking at the world with evolutionary eyes leaves us with a renewed sense of wonder about life's astounding present-day diversity, along with an appreciation of our evolutionary history.

Recreates the scientist's historic visit to the Galapagos Islands using his original notebooks and logs, the latest findings by scholars and researchers, and the authors' first-hand knowledge of the archipelago.

Natural History.

An insightful exploration of the iconic Galápagos tortoises, and how their fate is inextricably linked to our own in a rapidly changing world. Finalist for the 2020 E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award, sponsored by PEN America Literary Awards The Galápagos archipelago is often viewed as a last foothold of pristine nature. For sixty years, conservationists have worked to restore this evolutionary Eden after centuries of exploitation at the hands of pirates, whalers, and island settlers. This book tells the story of the islands’ namesakes—the giant tortoises—as coveted food sources, objects of natural history, and famous icons of conservation and tourism. By doing so, it brings into stark relief the paradoxical, and impossible, goal of conserving species by trying to restore a past state of prehistoric evolution. The tortoises, Elizabeth Hennessy demonstrates, are not prehistoric, but rather microcosms whose stories show how deeply human and nonhuman life are entangled. In a world where evolution is thoroughly shaped by global history, Hennessy puts forward a vision for conservation based on reckoning with the past, rather than trying to erase it. “Fresh, insightful . . . Hennessy’s melding of human and natural history makes for thought-provoking reading.” —Booklist (starred review) “Gripping . . . well-researched and thought-provoking . . . whether you’re well-versed in the intricacies of conservation or have only just begun to long for a look at the tortoises yourself. On the Backs of Tortoises is a natural history that asks important questions, and challenges us to think about how best to answer them.” —Genevieve Valentine, NPR “Wonderfully interesting, informative, and engaging, as well as scholarly.” —Janet Browne, author of Charles Darwin: Voyaging and Charles Darwin: The Power of Place

Darwin is a survivor, you have to give it that. Razed to the ground four times in its short history, it has picked itself up out of the debris to not only rebuild but grow... Darwin has known catastrophes and resurrections; it has endured misconceived projects and birthed visionaries. To know Darwin, to know its soul, yo have to listen to it, soak in it, taste it. This is a book about the textures, colours, sounds and frontier stories of Darwin, Australia's smallest and least-known capital city. Darwin is a place that has to be felt to be known. Readers will sense the heart, smell the odours, hear the birds and the frogs, encounter the mosquitoes, fathom racial politics and learn how the moon-base that is Darwin is kept alive. They will understand that Darwin is a military garrison and a portal into Australia's possible futures. In a new postscript, Tess Lea suggests how Darwin might deliver lessons for living under the climatically assaulting and culturally uncomfortable times of the Anthropocene.

Examining the role of performance in state-making

Natural Area Tourism provides an authoritative and comprehensive account of tourism in natural, wild and protected areas. The second edition contains an overview of key literature and new developments that have emerged since the publication of the first edition more than a decade ago. Accordingly, this book will remain an invaluable resource and review of the subject for many years to come.

The sustainability of tourism is increasingly under question given the challenges of overtourism, COVID-19 and the contribution of tourism to climate and environmental change. Degrowth and Tourism provides an original response to the central problem of growth in tourism, an imperative that has been intrinsic within tourism practice, and directs the reader to rethink the impacts of tourism and possible alternatives beyond the sustainable growth discourse. Using a multi-scaled approach to investigate degrowth’s macro effects and micro indications in tourism, this book frames degrowth in tourism in terms of business, destination and policy initiatives. It uses a combination of empirical research, case studies and theory to offer new perspectives and approaches to analyse issues related to overtourism, COVID-19, small-scale tourism operations and entrepreneurship, mobility and climate change in tourism. Interdisciplinary chapters provide studies on animal-based tourism, nature-based tourism, domestic tourism, developing community-centric tourism and many other areas, within the paradigm of degrowth. This book offers significant insight on both the implications of degrowth paradigm in tourism studies and practices, as well as tourism’s potential contributions to the degrowth paradigm, and will be essential reading for all those interested in sustainable tourism and transformations through tourism.

The hilarious New York Times bestselling phenomenon and the perfect funny gift! Honoring those who improve our gene pool by inadvertently removing themselves fromit, The Darwin Awards III includes more than one hundred brand new, hilariously macabre mishaps and misadventures. From a sheriff who inadvertently shot himself twice, to the insurance defrauder who amputated his leg with a chainsaw; from a farmer who avoided bee stings by sealing his head in a plastic bag to the man crushed by the branch he just trimmed, The Darwin Awards III proves again that when it comes to stupidity, no species does it like we do. Featuring scientific and safety discussions and filled with illustrations depicting inspiring examples of evolution in action, The Darwin Awards III shows once more how uncommon common sense still is.