Thor Hanson’s The Triumph of Seeds is an unexpected delight. Composed in charming and lively prose, the book introduces readers to a variety of quirky figures—biologists, farmers, archaeologists and everyday gardeners—who have something profound to say about a seemingly mundane topic: those little kernels that, against tremendous odds, have managed to take root all around us.

The impact seeds have had on human history can hardly be overstated, as Hanson enthusiastically makes quite clear in endless practical examples that range from the seeds needed for fracking to the variety of seeds in the average pantry. The author’s good cheer and curiosity lead to several memorable passages. In the first pages, for example, he aggressively attempts to split open a particularly well-guarded seed he gathered in the rain forest. Another chapter opens with the delicate dissection of an Almond Joy bar that quickly gives way to an extended discussion of the mysteries of the coconut seed.

Chapters are organized into themes about what seeds do best: nourish, unite, endure, defend, and travel. And within the chapters, Hanson wisely organizes material not so much by topic as by scene. He artfully draws readers into a particular moment, be it his attempt to teach a biology class about moss or the recounting of a spirited conversation with an archaeologist in New Mexico. There is something so approachable about this book, and something so confident and at home in the world about the writer.

For the reader the image of the natural world becomes, through this lens of seeds, at once finely detailed and gloriously panoramic. In all, The Triumph of Seeds is a remarkable, gentle and refreshing piece of work that draws readers further into the wide arms of the world and makes them grateful for it.

Michele Raffin was a suburban California mom who’d finally signed up to join a gym when, to her dismay, her personal trainer was extremely late for their session. When he finally arrived, he had a good reason for the delay: He’d come across a wounded bird by the side of the freeway. In what would become a life-changing moment, Raffin met that dove and tried to save it. And though it didn’t survive, she found herself a few days later responding to a newspaper ad seeking someone to rescue another dove. Her course in life was set.

Today Pandemonium Aviaries (her kids chose the name) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to breeding bird species that hover on the edge of extinction. Through Raffin’s fascinating account, we get a glimpse of the challenges of breeding wild birds in captivity. We follow her story of how one bird led to another, and another, and we learn what it takes to bear the responsibility for hundreds of living creatures.

Along the way, we meet some endearing personalities including Sweetie, a tiny quail left in a paper bag at a supermarket on its way to become someone’s dinner, and Oscar, a flightless Lady Gouldian finch with an indomitable will to survive.

As Raffin (and her family) become increasingly committed to rescuing and caring for birds, they realize that their charges require ever more specialized knowledge and care. Slowly but surely, and not without some heartbreaking setbacks, Raffin takes her place in the rarefied world of aviculture. Her sanctuary is now known for its success in breeding vulnerable species such as the lovely blue Victoria crowned pigeon of New Guinea.

Packed with dramatic incidents and unforgettable characters, both avian and human, The Birds of Pandemonium is the engaging story of one woman’s journey and her commitment to conservation.

This article was originally published in the October 2014 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Nature writer Nick Jans first spotted the large tracks of a wolf while cross-country skiing near his home in Juneau, Alaska, in December 2003. Two days later, while relaxing in his hot tub, he caught a glimpse of the animal itself. Nick raced out to see him, and soon he and his wife, Sherrie, became infatuated with the beautiful black wolf.

So did many others. The wolf was exceptionally friendly, appearing frequently and frolicking with dogs strolling with their owners in the shadow of the Mendenhall Glacier.

The Jans were so infatuated that they cancelled a Christmas vacation on a Mexican beach, preferring to stay to see this newcomer. One day Sherrie named him Romeo, and the name stuck. A Wolf Called Romeo is Jans' love letter to this wild creature who touched their lives.

Romeo wasn't part of a pack, and some wondered if he was mourning the loss of a wolf killed by a taxi earlier that year. For nearly six years, Romeo made frequent appearances on the outskirts of Juneau, disappearing each summer to hunt in the mountains.

As Jans explains, "During the black wolf's time among us, he brought wonder to thousands, filled a landscape to overflowing, taught many to see the world and his species with fresh eyes."

Jans is no stranger to human interaction with wild animals, having written The Grizzly Maze about a man named Timothy Treadwell, who lived―and died―among the grizzlies. And while many in Juneau cherished Romeo's presence, some did not. Jans rightly feared that some sort of clash, and even potential tragedy, might ultimately occur―but I will spare readers the spoiler of revealing what eventually transpired.

A Wolf Called Romeo is a thoughtful, highly detailed account of one community's poignant encounter with a truly magnificent creature

Martin Windrow never intended to require visitors to his London flat to don protective headgear, but that’s what happened. He had to protect his guests from the eight long talons of Mumble, the tawny owl who lived in his small, urban apartment. As you might guess, sharing a flat with Mumble required other accommodations as well. All surfaces had to be covered with either plastic or newspaper to protect them from Mumble’s unpredictable and very messy emissions. How could cohabitating with such a creature be worth these high costs?

To find out the answer, read Windrow’s new book, which meticulously chronicles his shared life with the adorably dangerous owl. Based on 15 years of detailed notebooks, The Owl Who Liked Sitting on Caesar is part homage to Mumble, part meditation on tawny owls generally (there’s a chapter called “The Private Life of a Tawny”), and part story about how one man’s life was undeniably enriched through a relationship with a wild creature. Windrow, an accomplished editor of books about military history, is a thorough narrator: His passages are full of detail, and his reflections on events are interspersed with quotes from his notebooks. In one particularly impressive chapter, “Mumble’s Year,” Windrow reads across several years of notebooks to identify how Mumble’s emotional life seemed tied to her annual molting of feathers.

The book is full of other charming passages, as well. Windrow describes how the little owl would fall asleep at his shoulder and nuzzle his face with her head. She seemed to find his daily rituals, such as shaving, fascinating. Likewise, Mumble utterly captivated Windrow. He wrote about her daily and read countless pages about her physiology. Her neck is especially impressive. Yet The Owl Who Liked Sitting on Caesar is no textbook. Windrow’s recollections are completely personal and filled with deep affection. Mumble died more than 20 years ago, and with time came clarity about the role she played in his life. Windrow did not get another tawny.

After reading The Owl Who Liked Sitting on Caesar, I don’t find myself eager to buy a predatory bird to keep in my home. However, I am grateful that Windrow did. By living with Mumble and writing about it, Windrow explores something of what it means to be human in a world of animals. His humanity was expanded by his life with this small creature, and readers can share some of the riches by simply reading his story.

Because he seldom cites specific dates or alludes to what’s happening in the outside world as he’s prowling through the jungle in Peru, Paul Rosolie’s Mother of God: An Extraordinary Journey into the Uncharted Tributaries of the Western Amazon has a breathless, dream-like quality—a tone one might find in the journals of a relentlessly eager and factually retentive Boy Scout.

And that’s as it should be since Rosolie brings a romantic, rather than a scientific, sensibility to his travels—at least initially. At the beginning, he’s out for adventure, pure and simple, not for such pedestrian pursuits as discovering rare ore or cataloging medicinal plants. Early on, though, he’s quick to spot the encroachments of “civilization” on his newfound paradise—poachers, miners, loggers and road builders.

“What is it about our species,” he asks incredulously, “that allows us to watch sitcoms and argue over sports while cultures and creatures and those things meek and green and good are chopped, shot, and burned from the world for a buck?”

An indifferent student, Rosolie was always a lover of the outdoors. He made his first foray into the Amazon in 2006, when he was 18, and instantly felt a part of that exotic environment. This book, his first, chronicles his many journeys into the jungle and his side trips to India, where he meets the woman he’ll marry. Not surprisingly, they bond over their mutual love of snakes.

Rosolie is a gripping storyteller who takes us along as he wrestles giant anacondas, stares closely into the eyes of a wounded jaguar and, on a solitary journey into the deepest reaches of the jungle, encounters what may have been a previously undiscovered tribe (from which he prudently runs away).

Rosolie’s enthusiasm for the wilderness and his ability to convey it poetically makes him an exceedingly persuasive advocate for conserving what’s left of the natural world.

Environmental author Rick Bass is basically a grizzly bear guy. Well, grizzlies and wolves. His writing ranges widely, but his home is in the Yaak Valley of Montana, and his focus has mostly been the American West. Still, the writer/activist is nothing if not adventurous, so when an opportunity arose a few years ago for a trip to southwest Africa, he was game. The impressive result is The Black Rhinos of Namibia, by turns exciting, reflective and moving.

The critically endangered black rhino had no real predators until men armed with guns happened along, reducing its population from an estimated 100,000 to below 2,500 in a remarkably short time. But by the time Bass arrived, the species was making a fragile comeback, thanks to the efforts of conservationists. Their hope is to develop a tourism industry around rhino-sighting—the kind of future that Bass would like to see for grizzlies.

In search of the elusive rhinos, Bass and a friend traveled with Mike Hearn, the young field director for the Save the Rhinos Trust. Their first sight of rhinos, a mother and calf, is the thrilling centerpiece of the book, at once exhilarating and frightening.

But Bass gives readers more than an entertaining adventure. He’s a ruminative writer, always turning over his own feelings and wrestling with the larger meaning of human interaction with the environment. And the book is a fine tribute to Hearn, whose devotion to the rhinos exemplifies for Bass how humans can save instead of destroy.

The search for sustainable sources of energy continues with great urgency in many places. One area that has attracted much attention in the last several years is a stratum of shale called the Marcellus, which was discovered 150 years ago and named for a small town in New York state where the layer of shale had, after a series of geological upheavals, been wrenched to the surface. Some estimates say it contains the third largest cache of natural gas in the world, with a potential worth in the millions of dollars.

Getting to that natural gas, however, is not easy. Part of the Marcellus stratum is in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, a rural, rocky, remote part of the state populated primarily by several generations of farmers and their families. When representatives from gas companies began to appear there and sought to persuade landowners to sign documents giving the companies the right to drill on their property, it set in motion a classic story of locals with deep family roots and a suspicion of Big Oil and Big Government versus large corporations willing to spend a lot of money in the hopes of eventually reaping huge profits. At the same time, it could also provide at least a short-term solution to the nation’s energy needs.

Journalist Seamus McGraw grew up in the area, and his mother was one of the first to be approached by an oil company wanting a lease to drill on her property. In The End of Country he tells the compelling story of how residents of the community were changed by this apparent good luck that led to, among other consequences both good and bad, what one resident called “the end of country.” Two of the prominent personalities in the story are Ken Ely, a sometimes cantankerous, self-described hermit who has lived there for many years, and a newcomer, Victoria Switzer, a former teacher who moved to the area with her husband to build a home that could be their refuge. Although different in so many ways, Ken and Victoria find themselves unlikely allies in dealing with some of the negative aspects of the big changes confronting the landowners. Another key figure is Terry Engelder, a Penn State University professor whose reading of the initial production reports from a few gas wells in the Marcellus shale led him to estimate greater productivity in the area than originally thought—setting off a frenzied bidding for access to landowners’ property.

But there is much more in this carefully researched and beautifully written account. McGraw wants us to understand that “the whole history of the Marcellus shale . . . was itself a history of random accidents and improbable coincidences.” He tells about unique and often desperate men who over the years were obsessed with mastering and subduing this vast area of potential underground energy. He gives us a history of some of these who made significant contributions but did not personally profit from them. Among many other subjects, he explains the controversial practice of “fracking,” the shorthand for “hydraulic fracturing.” Although drillers vouch for its safety, the state government of Pennsylvania and the federal government consider the used frack water to be so dangerous that they say it is the most toxic byproduct of gas development.

The story McGraw tells takes place over hundreds of millions of years, and it is also about our present and our future. It is a personal story about how families and a community met the challenges and dilemmas posed by the energy companies and by the protection of their own land and the environment. The End of Country is an important book that deals with complex issues in a reader-friendly way.