Why am I passionate about this?

I have always loved science and luckily had inspirational teachers at school and university. I ended up being a professor of molecular biology, but animal behavior has always fascinated me. Watching a total eclipse of the sun near my parentsā€™ house in Cornwall when horses started to behave unusually before the darkness fell piqued my interest in writing my book. Did they know it was coming? Reading about Dolbearā€™s Law using crickets to measure the air temperature led me to ask what was going on. The more reading I did, the more amazing stories became revealed, and it seemed timely to put this passion into a book. 


I wrote

Why Elephants Cry: How Observing Unusual Animal Behaviours Can Predict the Weather (and Other Environmental Phenomena)

By John T. Hancock,

Book cover of Why Elephants Cry: How Observing Unusual Animal Behaviours Can Predict the Weather (and Other Environmental Phenomena)

What is my book about?

This book collects information and stories on the ways in which animals have been used to measure or predict changesā€¦

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of Endurance

John T. Hancock Why did I love this book?

I loved this book as it tells an incredible story of the fight against the environment. Even though I knew how the adventure ended, I was still gripped, wondering what happened and how the people involved fought for their survival.

Understanding the ā€œlandā€ on which they found themselves and watching some of the animal behavior was key to their perseverance, even after they lost their ship. Although this is a true story, I still found it hard to believe that it really happened, and Lansingā€™s writing really brings the hardship they suffered and their bravery alive. 

By Alfred Lansing,

Why should I read it?

11 authors picked Endurance as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In August 1914, polar explorer Ernest Shackleton boarded the Endurance and set sail for Antarctica, where he planned to cross the last uncharted continent on foot. In January 1915, after battling its way through a thousand miles of pack ice and only a day's sail short of its destination, the Endurance became locked in an island of ice. Thus began the legendary ordeal of Shackleton and his crew of twenty-seven men. For ten months the ice-moored Endurance drifted northwest before it was finally crushed between two ice floes. With no options left, Shackleton and a skeleton crew attempted a near-impossibleā€¦


Book cover of Natural Weather Wisdom: By Uncle Offa

John T. Hancock Why did I love this book?

This was an amazing collection of facts and myths about predicting the weather. There is a superb range of dates and anecdotes, which made me really think about how people may use the events of the past to predict what might happen in the future.

I thought it was amazing that he included some discussion of earthquakes, and I was impressed about where he sought his information, often being contacted by members of the public about things he had not mentioned in his radio show. I think this is a great book to dip into during a year, seeing how the weather on one date might foresee the conditions on another. Fascinating. 

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Book cover of Third Wheel

Third Wheel by Richard R. Becker,

Third Wheel is a coming-of-age thriller about a misguided teen who struggles to fit in with a pack of older troublemakers. In this fast-paced page-turner, Brady Wilks is a root-worthy underdog who explores the complexities of identity, belonging, and betrayal.

Third Wheel won seven literary awards, including Literary Thriller ofā€¦

Book cover of The Lighthouse Stevensons

John T. Hancock Why did I love this book?

I love old technology, and lighthouses epitomize this. This book does two things. It brings to life the sheer hardship of building massive structures in what appear to be impossible places. Often, the engineers and builders had to battle the environment, and sometimes animals could help predict when catastrophe might be about to strike.

The book also tells the story of an amazing family who were instrumental in putting lights around our coasts. This saved, and still saves, thousands of lives. Reading such amazing stories as these shows the tenacity of those involved, and I think I can teach us a lot about becoming successful in the modern world, too. 

By Bella Bathurst,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Lighthouse Stevensons as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

An exciting new edition of Bella Bathurst's epic story of Robert Louis Stevenson's ancestors and the building of the Scottish coastal lighthouses against impossible odds.

'Whenever I smell salt water, I know that I am not far from one of the works of my ancestors,' wrote Robert Louis Stevenson in 1880. 'When the lights come out at sundown along the shores of Scotland, I am proud to think they burn more brightly for the genius of my father!'

Robert Louis Stevenson was the most famous of the Stevensons, but not by any means the most productive. The Lighthouse Stevensons, allā€¦


Book cover of The Glass Universe: The Hidden History of the Women Who Took the Measure of the Stars

John T. Hancock Why did I love this book?

Dava Sobel is one of my favorite science writers; this book does not disappoint. The book tells the story of the discoveries of those who stared at the stars but brings to the fore the work of the army of women who carried out the hard slog of analyzing thousands of glass plate-based photographsā€“only for the lead scientists to take credit.

One of the characters is Harlow Shapley, who, when not doing his day job, studied ants as a way to measure the air temperature. How cool is that! I love the wide-ranging nature of the interests of scientists such as this, a feature we see less of in todayā€™s scientific endeavors, which I think is sad. It is a great book that can enlighten us about science and the instrumental role of women in this bit of history. 

By Dava Sobel,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Glass Universe as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

AN OBSERVER BOOK OF THE YEAR

`A peerless intellectual biography. The Glass Universe shines and twinkles as brightly as the stars themselves' The Economist

#1 New York Times bestselling author Dava Sobel returns with a captivating, little-known true story of women in science

In the mid-nineteenth century, the Harvard College Observatory began employing women as calculators, or "human computers," to interpret the observations their male counterparts made via telescope each night. As photography transformed the practice of astronomy, the women turned to studying images of the stars captured on glass photographic plates, making extraordinary discoveries that attracted worldwide acclaim. Theyā€¦


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Book cover of Lethal Impulse

Lethal Impulse by Steve Rush,

Heā€™s riddled with guilt. Sheā€™s annoyed with the status quo.

The death of a crime bossā€™s daughter forces Detective Neil Caldera to leave NYC. He seeks refuge in the tranquil embrace of a small town, where he finds himself entangled in the labyrinth of a teenage girlā€™s murder. Tess Fleishmanā€™sā€¦

Book cover of Where the Crawdads Sing

John T. Hancock Why did I love this book?

I loved this fiction book based on a young woman who had to become one with her environment to survive. With the backdrop of a crime to solve, this book gripped me from the start. It is a well-crafted story, and I really wanted to know how it ended. Even though I now know, I still have read this book twice, and seen the film which follows the book well. I would recommend reading it before watching the film.

I liked how the book had so much depth, weaving in issues around the characters' cultures, as well as the amazing setting of the waterways, beaches and sea. I found this book such a joy to read.

By Delia Owens,

Why should I read it?

57 authors picked Where the Crawdads Sing as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

OVER 12 MILLION COPIES SOLD WORLDWIDE
NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE
A NUMBER ONE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

For years, rumours of the 'Marsh Girl' have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to beā€¦


Explore my book šŸ˜€

Why Elephants Cry: How Observing Unusual Animal Behaviours Can Predict the Weather (and Other Environmental Phenomena)

By John T. Hancock,

Book cover of Why Elephants Cry: How Observing Unusual Animal Behaviours Can Predict the Weather (and Other Environmental Phenomena)

What is my book about?

This book collects information and stories on the ways in which animals have been used to measure or predict changes in the environment. People watch to see if cows are lying down or gulls are flying inland, while some have attempted to harness such knowledge in devices using animals, such as the Tempest Prognosticator or Bermudian shark oil barometers. Both these are said to predict the onset of a storm, including the direction in which the bad weather will arrive.

Volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and tsunamis can all be predicted using animals. Using a variety of stories from around the world and scientific literature, the use of animals to measure ambient temperature and predict weather and environmental events is discussed. 

Book cover of Endurance
Book cover of Natural Weather Wisdom: By Uncle Offa
Book cover of The Lighthouse Stevensons

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