The Flight of the Iguana: A Sidelong View of Science and Nature

by David Quammen

Overview

From the award-winning author of The Song of the Dodo comes a collection of essays in which various weird and wonderful aspects of nature are examined. This book contains tales of vegetarian piranha fish, voiceless dogs, and a scientific search for the genes that threaten to destroy the cheetah.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781476728735
Publisher:	Scribner
Publication date:	10/16/2012
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	144,543
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

David Quammen is an author and journalist who lives in Montana. His books include The Song of the Dodo, The Reluctant Mr. Darwin, and Spillover. He has written for numerous magazines, and is a contributing writer for National Geographic. He has received the New York Public Library/Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism, the Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction, and the PEN/Spielvogel-Diamonstein Award for the Art of the Essay. Spillover was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and a Scientific American Book of the Year.

Editorial Reviews

Quammen's columns in Outdoor Magazine are famed as an entertaining source of offbeat information. In this collection, he casts sidelong glances at creationism and extinction, at giant earthworms and Canada geese. But he takes a direct view at the plight of Salvadoran refugees and at the Sanctuary Movement; he accompanied one group on a dramatic journey across the Sonoran desert. Quammen examines the special problems of species survival on islands (and tells us what is happening to the birds of Guam); he discusses the unusually small gene pool of cheetahs and how the Papago Indians survive in desert lands. There is a piece about visiting the Okefenokee Swamp, while the title essay is set in the Galapagos. Readers who enjoyed Natural Acts will find Quammen's new collection equally interesting. (June)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Naturalist Quammen's essays, originally appearing as magazine columns, are here compiled into a lively book. His unusual way of seeing leads him into fascinating realms. How many of us have studied the face of a spider or spent an hour thinking about earthworms? Quammen has and shares his observations with us. His widely varied and thought-provoking essays range over humans and their interactions with ecology, including both desert and swamp. The only central focus of the book is Quammen's unified view of the world's natural life, which of course includes us. Recommended. Katharine Galloway Garstka, Intergraph Corp., Huntsville, Ala.

Library Journal