Here are 100 books that A Pirate of Exquisite Mind fans have personally recommended if you like
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As an engineer, scientist, and historian, I’ve always been fascinated by how science has always served the political goals of nations and empires. Today, we look at the Space Race to land a person on the Moon as a part of the Cold War effort to establish the intellectual and cultural dominance of the United States and the Soviet Union, even as it created new technologies and completely changed our understanding of the world. When I came across the Geodesic Mission to the Equator 1735-1744, I realized that even in the 18th century, voyages of discovery could do more than simply find new lands to conquer and exploit–they could, and did extend our knowledge of nature and mankind.
Alexander von Humboldt’s name is synonymous with scientific discovery today–the Humboldt Current, the Humboldt Redwoods State Park, and countless species named for him. Humboldt revolutionized our modern understanding of the natural sciences–geology, biology, meteorology, and much else–with his epic five-year voyage that set off in 1799 and brought him through the Amazon, the Caribbean, and North and South America.
Like Malaspina before him, Humboldt studied not only the flora and fauna of these regions but also their peoples and the political turmoil that was building towards revolution. He met with the leaders of the time–Thomas Jefferson and Simón Bolívar among them–and opened their eyes to the richness of their lands. Unlike Malaspina, Humboldt’s works were published to wide acclaim and established the idea that all nature, including human nature, is interconnected.
WINNER OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY SCIENCE BOOK PRIZE 2016
'A thrilling adventure story' Bill Bryson
'Dazzling' Literary Review
'Brilliant' Sunday Express
'Extraordinary and gripping' New Scientist
'A superb biography' The Economist
'An exhilarating armchair voyage' GILES MILTON, Mail on Sunday
Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) is the great lost scientist - more things are named after him than anyone else. There are towns, rivers, mountain ranges, the ocean current that runs along the South American coast, there's a penguin, a giant squid - even the Mare Humboldtianum on the moon.
Born and raised in Mississippi, I have long been fascinated with the natural history of the South and of the Americas in general. And as an outdoorsy guy, a NOLS graudate, mountain-biker, trail-runner, and paddler, I revel in reading accounts of the early days of Western exploration in the woodlands, mountains, and coastal regions of our hemisphere. Finally, as an avid reader and now author, I constantly seek out enthralling and wide-ranging narratives about exploration, outdoor adventure, and the natural world.
I had never heard of Maria Sybilla Merian before researching my latest book, but her life was amazing.
A brilliant artist, Merian lived an unconventional life—even before going to the Dutch colony of Surinam in 1698 accompanied only by her daughter. There Merian produced stunning and important works, illustrating the life cycles of insects and relationships between insect and plant species.
Before Darwin, before Audubon, before Gilbert White, there was Merian. An artist turned naturalist, known for her botanical illustrations, Maria Sybilla Merian was born in Germany just sixteen years after Galileo proclaimed that the earth orbited the sun. But at the age of fifty she sailed from Europe to the New World on a solo scientific expedition to study insect metamorphosis - an unheard-of journey for any naturalist at that time, much less an unaccompanied woman. When she returned she produced a book that secured her reputation, only to have it savaged in the nineteenth century by scientists who disdained…
Born and raised in Mississippi, I have long been fascinated with the natural history of the South and of the Americas in general. And as an outdoorsy guy, a NOLS graudate, mountain-biker, trail-runner, and paddler, I revel in reading accounts of the early days of Western exploration in the woodlands, mountains, and coastal regions of our hemisphere. Finally, as an avid reader and now author, I constantly seek out enthralling and wide-ranging narratives about exploration, outdoor adventure, and the natural world.
This was an essential reference for my own book about Mark Catesby, the artist/explorer/naturalist who created the first illustrated book on North American wildlife. McBurney is an esteemed art historian; her book is academic yet far from dry—a large-format, sumptuously-illustrated book about a remarkable man and his groundbreaking work.
The life and art of the 18th-century naturalist Mark Catesby, and his pioneering work depicting the flora and fauna of North America, are explored in vibrant detail
This book explores the life and work of the celebrated eighteenth-century English naturalist, explorer, artist and author Mark Catesby (1683-1749). During Catesby's lifetime, science was poised to shift from a world of amateur virtuosi to one of professional experts. Working against a backdrop of global travel that incorporated collecting and direct observation of nature, Catesby spent two prolonged periods in the New World - in Virginia (1712-19) and South Carolina and the Bahamas…
Tap Dancing on Everest, part coming-of-age memoir, part true-survival adventure story, is about a young medical student, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor raised in N.Y.C., who battles self-doubt to serve as the doctor—and only woman—on a remote Everest climb in Tibet.
Born and raised in Mississippi, I have long been fascinated with the natural history of the South and of the Americas in general. And as an outdoorsy guy, a NOLS graudate, mountain-biker, trail-runner, and paddler, I revel in reading accounts of the early days of Western exploration in the woodlands, mountains, and coastal regions of our hemisphere. Finally, as an avid reader and now author, I constantly seek out enthralling and wide-ranging narratives about exploration, outdoor adventure, and the natural world.
William Bartram is the first great Native American naturalist.
His Travels recount his journeys through the American Southeast between 1773 and 1776, and contain unparalleled descriptions of the flora and fauna of the region, as well as his ethnographic studies of Native Americans there. The Library of America edition is top-notch.
Artist, writer, botanist, gardener, naturalist, intrepid wilderness explorer, and self-styled “philosophical pilgrim,” William Bartram was an extraordinary figure in eighteenth-century American life. The first American to devote himself to what we would now call the environment, Bartram was the most significant American writer before Thoreau and a nature artist who rivals Audubon. He was also a pioneering ethnographer whose works are a crucial source for the study of the Indian cultures of southeastern America. The Library of America presents the first collection of his writings and the largest gathering of his remarkable drawings ever published.
The ocean has always been a sacred place to me, full of wondrous adventures and knowledge. I grew up in the Hawaiian islands with many hours frolicking in the waves, and swinging from the vines of nearshore banyan trees. One of my favorite books as a child was Treasure Island, anchored by the quest for Flint’s treasure map. Ironically, the details of that map are never revealed in the book. But I grew up to become a mapper of the ocean, making with my colleagues at Esri, a host of digital maps that reveal treasures of scientific insight. May the books on my list become treasures for you, too.
This is a book about my all-time scientific heroes, so I could not put it down. I loved how it revealed beautiful details about the life of this woman whom I had grown to love merely by looking at her maps, a woman who had single-handedly invented the field in which I now work!
The more I researched her real backstory, the more convinced I became that this story, not only in words but also in data and MAPS, must continue to be told for the future of science and our planet. It is a remarkable testament to persistence, conviction, and courageous quirkiness. I think about Marie Tharp and this book nearly every day.
In a time when women were held back by the casually sexist atmosphere of mid-twentieth century academia - a time when trained geologists like Tharp were routinely relegated to the role of secretary or assistant - Tharp's work would completely change the world's understanding of our planet's evolution. By transforming dry data into beautifully detailed maps that laid the groundwork for proving the then-controversial theory of continental drift, Tharp, along with her lifelong partner, Bruce Heezen, upended scientific consensus and ushered in a new era in geology and oceanography.
The ocean has always been a sacred place to me, full of wondrous adventures and knowledge. I grew up in the Hawaiian islands with many hours frolicking in the waves, and swinging from the vines of nearshore banyan trees. One of my favorite books as a child was Treasure Island, anchored by the quest for Flint’s treasure map. Ironically, the details of that map are never revealed in the book. But I grew up to become a mapper of the ocean, making with my colleagues at Esri, a host of digital maps that reveal treasures of scientific insight. May the books on my list become treasures for you, too.
I often fail to see the close connection between the culture at sea in centuries past and how some of that has persisted to this day, both at sea and in many aspects of our culture, especially science.
This book hit me squarely between the eyes with that. I was deliciously captured within the pages of the story both for some of the unsettling, even shocking descriptions of hardships back in that day (and would I have been able to survive were I in that circumstance, even as a woman) and the cautionary tale it brings about loyalty, ethics, courage, and just plain doing your job to the best of your ability.
'The beauty of The Wager unfurls like a great sail... one of the finest nonfiction books I've ever read' Guardian
'The greatest sea story ever told' Spectator
'A cracking yarn... Grann's taste for desperate predicaments finds its fullest expression here' Observer
THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES NO. 1 BESTSELLER
From the international bestselling author of KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON and THE LOST CITY OF Z, a mesmerising story of shipwreck, mutiny and murder, culminating in a court martial that reveals a shocking truth.
On 28th January 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on the…
The Model Spy is based on the true story of Toto Koopman, who spied for the Allies and Italian Resistance during World War II.
Largely unknown today, Toto was arguably the first woman to spy for the British Intelligence Service. Operating in the hotbed of Mussolini's Italy, she courted danger…
The ocean has always been a sacred place to me, full of wondrous adventures and knowledge. I grew up in the Hawaiian islands with many hours frolicking in the waves, and swinging from the vines of nearshore banyan trees. One of my favorite books as a child was Treasure Island, anchored by the quest for Flint’s treasure map. Ironically, the details of that map are never revealed in the book. But I grew up to become a mapper of the ocean, making with my colleagues at Esri, a host of digital maps that reveal treasures of scientific insight. May the books on my list become treasures for you, too.
Even as an oceanographer myself, I was transfixed and transported by this book. And I loved hearing about the author’s own explorations to the deep. I love the pieces of deepsea exploration history that are in this book; that blew me away, even as someone who has contributed to exploration myself!
I loved the plotlines better than any movie or TV drama, for sure! And not only is the prose thrilling, ethereal, and beautiful, but it has helped me to renew my strength, as a foot soldier in the environmental call to action that is a huge part of this story.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From bestselling author Susan Casey, an awe-inspiring portrait of the mysterious world beneath the waves, and the men and women who seek to uncover its secrets
“An irresistible mix of splendid scholarship, heart-stopping adventure writing, and vivid, visceral prose." —Sy Montgomery, New York Times best-selling author of The Soul of an Octopus
For all of human history, the deep ocean has been a source of wonder and terror, an unknown realm that evoked a singular, compelling question: What’s down there? Unable to answer this for centuries, people believed the deep was a sinister realm of…
The ocean has always been a sacred place to me, full of wondrous adventures and knowledge. I grew up in the Hawaiian islands with many hours frolicking in the waves, and swinging from the vines of nearshore banyan trees. One of my favorite books as a child was Treasure Island, anchored by the quest for Flint’s treasure map. Ironically, the details of that map are never revealed in the book. But I grew up to become a mapper of the ocean, making with my colleagues at Esri, a host of digital maps that reveal treasures of scientific insight. May the books on my list become treasures for you, too.
I could totally see myself and my science in this book. It was so much fun to read about so many people that I have been to sea and worked with in other ways but to hear about this amazing work and why it is so important in a fresh new way. As a result, I didn’t want to say goodbye to this book, especially because so many of us are still out there adding more chapters to this continuing story!
The dramatic and action-packed story of the last mysterious place on earth-the world's seafloor-and the deep-sea divers, ocean mappers, marine biologists, entrepreneurs, and adventurers involved in the historic push to chart it, as well as the opportunities, challenges, and perils this exploration holds now and for the future.
Five oceans-the Atlantic, the Pacific, the Indian, the Arctic, and the Southern-cover approximately 70 percent of the earth. Yet we know little about what lies beneath them. By the early 2020s, less than twenty-five percent of the ocean's floor has been charted, most close to shorelines, and over three quarters of the…
I became fascinated with geography as a teenager and spent my life studying it. I always wanted to understand how we transform our planet, for better or worse. Part of this is understanding what happens in particular localities, which I have been able to look at closely by visiting places across all continents (except Antarctica). Part of it is understanding how the complex relations between human society and everything else shape global futures. My long-standing passion, however, has been understanding how what happens in one locality is shaped by its evolving connections with the rest of the world. These books pushed me to see the world differently through these connections.
I found this to be such a fun read, trying to solve a geographical mystery. I knew that China was a seafaring country before Europe, but this transformed my understanding.
Drawing on his experience as a sailor, Menzies reinterprets Chinese naval documents to narrate how its "treasure ships"—much bigger than Columbus’ boats—visited Asia, Africa, Australia, and possibly North America long before 1492. Before Europeans became colonizers, the Chinese Emperor decided to stop such explorations. Before 1492, China was more prosperous and sophisticated than Europe, but the Chinese emperor’s decision left the global playing field open for Europe to exploit.
On March 8, 1421, the largest fleet the world had ever seen set sail from China to "proceed all the way to the ends of the earth to collect tribute from the barbarians beyond the seas." When the fleet returned home in October 1423, the emperor had fallen, leaving China in political and economic chaos. The great ships were left to rot at their moorings and the records of their journeys were destroyed. Lost in the long, self-imposed isolation that followed was the knowledge that Chinese ships had reached America seventy years before Columbus and had circumnavigated the globe a…
The first and only full-length biography of Hazel Ying Lee, an unrecognized pioneer and unsung World War II hero who fought for a country that actively discriminated against her gender, race, and ambition.
This unique hidden figure defied countless stereotypes to become the first Asian American woman in United States…
During two decades as a gardening columnist for the Toronto Star, I wrote about hundreds of different plants. I also penned, for various publishers, over half a dozen books with titles ranging from Incredible Edibles: 40 Fun Things to Grow in the City and The Untamed Garden: A Revealing Look at our Love Affair with Plants. And in doing so, I got hooked. Even if you aren’t interested in gardening, the botanical world is chock-a-block with terrific stories. My new novel, for instance, published in 2022, begins with an extraordinary tale about a plant called The Corpse Flower which bloomed for the first time in 70 years at Brooklyn Botanical Garden.
Another engrossing book that I’ve read several times, by a professor of English at the University of Louisville. Ridley relates the amazing true – but little known – story of Jeanne Baret, the first woman to sail around the world. She did it disguised as a man in order to accompany her lover, a botanist called Philibert Commerson on a plant collecting expedition back in the 18th century. When they got to Brazil, Baret discovered the vine bougainvillea, which the pair named after the expedition leader, Count de Bougainville (with Commerson, of course, taking all the credit) and she endured incredible hardships keeping her identity secret from the male crew during the arduous voyage. Dried specimens of her finds can still be seen today at the Jardin des Plantes in Paris.
The year was 1765. Eminent botanist Philibert Commerson had just been appointed to a grand new expedition: the first French circumnavigation of the world. As the ships’ official naturalist, Commerson would seek out resources—medicines, spices, timber, food—that could give the French an edge in the ever-accelerating race for empire.
Jeanne Baret, Commerson’s young mistress and collaborator, was desperate not to be left behind. She disguised herself as a teenage boy and signed on as his assistant. The journey made the twenty-six-year-old, known to her shipmates as “Jean” rather than “Jeanne,” the first woman to ever sail around the globe. Yet…
