Fans pick 100 books like Tokyo Digs a Garden

By Jon-Erik Lappano, Kellen Hatanaka (illustrator),

Here are 100 books that Tokyo Digs a Garden fans have personally recommended if you like Tokyo Digs a Garden. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Secret Place

Erica Silverman Author Of Wake Up, City!

From my list on celebrating cities.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am an award-winning author of picture books and early readers. I have set my stories in many kinds of locations, including a haunted house, an Eastern European shtetl, an English Renaissance village, and a working cattle ranch. For Wake Up, City, I turned to the setting I know best, the city. I drew on memories of walking to kindergarten in early morning Brooklyn. This book is my love song to cities everywhere. As a lifelong city dweller, I worry about the impact of urban spread on the planet, but I feel hopeful, too, because many cities are becoming more nature and wildlife-friendly. The books I'm excited to share celebrate city wildlife. 

Erica's book list on celebrating cities

Erica Silverman Why did Erica love this book?

This is based on the L.A. River (which is undergoing an exciting revitalization) but it could be any industrial downtown: freeways, warehouses, graffiti, smog. A boy discovers a secret place, where a river still runs through a concrete bed. In hushed tones, he tells us who else knows his secret - an egret, a green-winged teal, nesting mallards, coyotes, and possum. The vivid description makes me feel as if I am right there with him, sharing his sense of wonder. This deceptively simple book offers a powerful argument for restoring green space. 

By Eve Bunting, Ted Rand (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Secret Place as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A small boy finds a secret place in the city that he shares with a white egret, mallards, and even ducklings.


Book cover of Old Pearl

Curtis Manley Author Of The Rescuer of Tiny Creatures

From my list on empathy for the world’s creatures.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always been interested in the natural world. I grew up seeing the birds, raccoons, and deer that lived in the woods near my home in Western Pennsylvania. But over the years I began watching smaller things more carefully: tiny creatures with many legs—or no legs at all! I learned that even though earthworms are blind they can sense light. I realized that among “identical” ants, some behaved differently. I found out that if I was gentle, honeybees didn’t mind being petted. Even if we think they’re icky, we owe these tiny creatures our understanding and compassion.

Curtis' book list on empathy for the world’s creatures

Curtis Manley Why did Curtis love this book?

Perhaps the soft spot I have for this book is because it’s another story about rescuing a wild animal and giving it a further chance.

Every day at the park, Theo makes sure the slow bird with the raggedy wing gets some of the birdseed he throws to the younger, quicker birds. But when a dog runs at the birds, Theo learns that old Pearl, as he names her, can’t fly. He saves Pearl and brings her home, and he and his grandma take care of the bird. Theo’s heartfelt concern allows Pearl to live the rest of her life out of danger, and she and Theo become close companions. But with animal friends, there will come a time to have to say goodbye...

By Wendy Wahman,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Old Pearl as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 4, 5, 6, and 7.

What is this book about?

A young boy deals with the sadness of losing a pet in this gentle, sweet ode to how nothing can take away what lives in our heart.

Theo loves feeding the birds. All the birds. But he tries his hardest to aim his seeds to the old bird with the raggedy wing—Pearl.

Soon, they are sharing apples and peanut butter, enjoying a good breeze, and sitting heartbeat to heartbeat.

But sometimes friends have to say goodbye…


Book cover of Finding Wild

Erica Silverman Author Of Wake Up, City!

From my list on celebrating cities.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am an award-winning author of picture books and early readers. I have set my stories in many kinds of locations, including a haunted house, an Eastern European shtetl, an English Renaissance village, and a working cattle ranch. For Wake Up, City, I turned to the setting I know best, the city. I drew on memories of walking to kindergarten in early morning Brooklyn. This book is my love song to cities everywhere. As a lifelong city dweller, I worry about the impact of urban spread on the planet, but I feel hopeful, too, because many cities are becoming more nature and wildlife-friendly. The books I'm excited to share celebrate city wildlife. 

Erica's book list on celebrating cities

Erica Silverman Why did Erica love this book?

Told in lyrical language, two children wander through their city, looking for “wild” and finding it in motion, size, sounds, touch, and smell.“It leaps and pounces and  shows its teeth.” The words dance around, hinting at flora and fauna, using adjectives and verbs to suggest and evoke. This journey arouses awareness of the natural world that lives all around us in the city. Young readers will enjoy guessing what is being hinted at. This is such an original way to talk about the urban wild!  

By Megan Wagner Lloyd, Abigail Halpin (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Finding Wild as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 3, 4, 5, and 6.

What is this book about?

A lovely, lyrical picture book with gorgeous illustrations that explores the ways the wild makes itself known to us and how much closer it is than we think.
 
There are so many places that wild can exist, if only you know where to look! Can you find it? Two kids set off on an adventure away from their urban home and discover all the beauty of the natural world. From the bark on the trees to the sudden storm that moves across the sky to fire and flowers, and snowflakes and fresh fruit. As the children make their way through…


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Book cover of What Walks This Way: Discovering the Wildlife Around Us Through Their Tracks and Signs

What Walks This Way By Sharman Apt Russell,

Nature writer Sharman Apt Russell tells stories of her experiences tracking wildlife—mostly mammals, from mountain lions to pocket mice—near her home in New Mexico, with lessons that hold true across North America. She guides readers through the basics of identifying tracks and signs, revealing a landscape filled with the marks…

Book cover of Cougar Crossing: How Hollywood's Celebrity Cougar Helped Build a Bridge for City Wildlife

Erica Silverman Author Of Wake Up, City!

From my list on celebrating cities.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am an award-winning author of picture books and early readers. I have set my stories in many kinds of locations, including a haunted house, an Eastern European shtetl, an English Renaissance village, and a working cattle ranch. For Wake Up, City, I turned to the setting I know best, the city. I drew on memories of walking to kindergarten in early morning Brooklyn. This book is my love song to cities everywhere. As a lifelong city dweller, I worry about the impact of urban spread on the planet, but I feel hopeful, too, because many cities are becoming more nature and wildlife-friendly. The books I'm excited to share celebrate city wildlife. 

Erica's book list on celebrating cities

Erica Silverman Why did Erica love this book?

A true story about my favorite cougar. P-22, (Puma 22) became famous when he miraculously managed to cross four freeways and make his home in a big city park near downtown Los Angeles. His fame inspired a campaign to build a wildlife crossing between two mountain ranges, over one of the world’s busiest highways. This book tells of P-22 and the scientists who are creating a better future for wild creatures and the humans who love them. I’ve been a fan of P-22 for many years and was thrilled to read this wonderful book about him. 

By Meeg Pincus, Alexander Vidal (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Cougar Crossing as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 3, 4, 5, and 6.

What is this book about?

Discover the amazing true story of P-22, the wild cougar living in Los Angeles, in this inspiring picture book.

P-22, the famed “Hollywood Cougar,” was born in a national park near Los Angeles, California. When it was time for him to leave home and stake a claim to his own territory, he embarked on a perilous journey—somehow crossing sixteen lanes of the world’s worst traffic—to make his home in LA’s Griffith Park, overlooking the famed Hollywood sign. But Griffith Park is a tiny territory for a mountain lion, and P-22’s life has been filled with struggles.

Residents of Los Angeles…


Book cover of The Curious Garden

Laura Alary Author Of What Grew in Larry's Garden

From my list on gardening as community building.

Why am I passionate about this?

Although I am no gardening expert, I’ve always been intrigued by seeds. It amazes me that such tiny things hold so much: colour, scent, flavour, food, and the community that grows in the tending and sharing of it. Every winter since I published What Grew in Larry’s Garden, the real Larry sends me an envelope filled with tomato seeds and reminds me to give some to my neighbours. It makes me smile to think that my story has become its own kind of seed, growing friendship, and connecting people. I hope the book does that for you too.  

Laura's book list on gardening as community building

Laura Alary Why did Laura love this book?

Out for a walk one day in his dreary urban neighbourhood, Liam stumbles upon a patch of dying plants growing around an abandoned railway track. Although he knows nothing about growing things, he can see the plants need a gardener, so he decides to help them. 

The story of what happens to the garden is charming, but what makes this book a favourite of mine is Liam—a little master of equanimity and confidence. Instead of feeling insecure about his lack of gardening experience and knowledge, he sees a need and gets to work. Rather than fretting about his failed attempts, he keeps trying and finds better ways. Liam embodies the power of starting small and caring for one thing at a time.

By Peter Brown,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Curious Garden as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This gorgeously illustrated picture book opens to a detailed spread of a gray city. If you look closely, you can spot the tiny figure of a red-headed boy, Liam, walking down the street. THE CURIOUS GARDEN tells the story of how this young boy discovers a door that leads up to abandoned railroad tracks where he finds a forgotten garden. He cares for the plants and helps them flourish, and they gradually spread throughout the city, transforming it, bit by bit, into a lush, green world.

With spare text and breathtaking illustrations, and a classic feel reminiscent of THE LITTLE…


Book cover of Greyhound Nation: A Coevolutionary History of England, 1200-1900

Michael Worboys Author Of Doggy People: The Victorians Who Made the Modern Dog

From my list on the history of modern dogs.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a historian of biology and biomedicine who has always been an outsider. Most of my colleagues have worked on ‘Darwin to DNA’ – evolution, physiology, genetics, and molecular biology. My interests have been in applied biology – parasites, insects, fungi, bacteria, biomedicine, animal diseases, and latterly dogs. It was a book on rabies, that I wrote with Neil Pemberton, that got me into dogs. In our research and writing we explored the wider social history of dog ownership and then, encouraged by the new interest in Animal History, researched how, and by whom, dogs’ bodies and behaviour had been shaped and reshaped, beginning in the Victorian period. 

Michael's book list on the history of modern dogs

Michael Worboys Why did Michael love this book?

Edmund Russell has a challenging approach to History. He wants histories of human societies and animals to be written together.

It is uncontroversial that humans shaped domestic and farm animals, but Russell contends that these animals have shaped human societies, in a process he terms coevolution.

This fascinating book reveals the coevolution of greyhounds and humans. Greyhounds were created with the physique and speed to catch hares on country estates. Then in the nineteenth century, through organized coursing events and dog shows, greyhounds became standardized and more uniform in look.

The new greyhounds created new social roles through the democratization of greyhound ownership and new recreational opportunities. Coursing was reinvented in the twentieth century as greyhound racing, an innovative mass urban entertainment, where dogs chased electrically powered hares in a floodlit spectacle.

By Edmund Russell,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Greyhound Nation as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Edmund Russell's much-anticipated new book examines interactions between greyhounds and their owners in England from 1200 to 1900 to make a compelling case that history is an evolutionary process. Challenging the popular notion that animal breeds remain uniform over time and space, Russell integrates history and biology to offer a fresh take on human-animal coevolution. Using greyhounds in England as a case study, Russell shows that greyhounds varied and changed just as much as their owners. Not only did they evolve in response to each other, but people and dogs both evolved in response to the forces of modernization, such…


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Book cover of Diary of a Citizen Scientist: Chasing Tiger Beetles and Other New Ways of Engaging the World

Diary of a Citizen Scientist By Sharman Apt Russell,

Citizen Scientist begins with this extraordinary statement by the Keeper of Entomology at the London Museum of Natural History, “Study any obscure insect for a week and you will then know more than anyone else on the planet.”

As the author chases the obscure Western red-bellied tiger beetle across New…

Book cover of Steady-State Economics

Rex Weyler Author Of Greenpeace: The Inside Story

From my list on ecology from an ecologist.

Why am I passionate about this?

Rex Weyler is a writer and ecologist. His books include Blood of the Land, a history of indigenous American nations, nominated for a Pulitzer Prize; Greenpeace: The Inside Story, a finalist for the BC Book Award and the Shaughnessy-Cohen Award for Political Writing; and The Jesus Sayings, a deconstruction of first-century history, a finalist for the BC Book Award. In the 1970s, Weyler was a co-founder of Greenpeace International and editor of the Greenpeace Chronicles. He served on campaigns to preserve rivers and forests, and to stop whaling, sealing, and toxic dumping.

Rex's book list on ecology from an ecologist

Rex Weyler Why did Rex love this book?

Want solutions? Start with our failed economic system. Daly, a World Bank senior economist, examines the economic restructuring necessary to live on a finite planet. He corrects the errors of classic economics by showing that a human economy is a subsystem embedded in a finite, fragile ecosystem, maintained by extracting limited resources and exporting waste. A steady-state economy accounts for the limits of both resources and waste. 

By Herman E. Daly,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Steady-State Economics as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?


First published in 1977, this volume caused a sensation because of Daly's radical view that "enough is best." Today, his ideas are recognized as the key to sustainable development, and Steady-State Economics is universally acknowledged as the leading book on the economics of sustainability.


Book cover of Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World

Becky Selengut Author Of Shroom: Mind-Bendingly Good Recipes for Cultivated and Wild Mushrooms

From my list on a journey into the fantastic world of fungi.

Why am I passionate about this?

My first favorite food was a mushroom and as a budding young chef, my first dish, made at 6, was a terrible take on mushrooms on toast points made with Wonder Bread, margarine, and a sad can of mushrooms. My father pretended to eat it. For his sake, I’m glad he didn’t. Things have improved for me since then and I turned my passion for mushrooms into a lifelong love of cooking them which led to my book Shroom, a cookbook for both mushroom lovers and avowed fungiphobes. Mushrooms have distinct culinary personalities and the diversity in edible mushrooms is as vast as that between a salinic, ocean-kissed oyster and a smoky, meaty grilled ribeye. 

Becky's book list on a journey into the fantastic world of fungi

Becky Selengut Why did Becky love this book?

I had the opportunity to hear Paul Stamets speak at SOMA, a sleep-away camp for mushroom nerds in Northern California. Believe me when I say, it was as if the Beatles had descended when he stepped onstage. Short of screaming and the tearing off of t-shirts, the crowd hung on his every word, not a soul blinking or talking for fear of missing something. The word “visionary” is often used to describe Stamets, and I would add “architect”, for he maps out for the world in Mycelium Running how mushrooms can help save our planet. I used to think he wielded his immense knowledge of the environmental powers of mushrooms like a hammer always seeing a nail, but with time I’ve learned that people are considered visionaries when the majority of people aren’t listening to the truth even when it’s put right in front of them. Paul Stamets 1: World…

By Paul Stamets,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Mycelium Running as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Mycelium Running is a manual for the mycological rescue of the planet. That’s right: growing more mushrooms may be the best thing we can do to save the environment, and in this groundbreaking text from mushroom expert Paul Stamets, you’ll find out how.
 
The basic science goes like this: Microscopic cells called “mycelium”--the fruit of which are mushrooms--recycle carbon, nitrogen, and other essential elements as they break down plant and animal debris in the creation of rich new soil. What Stamets has discovered is that we can capitalize on mycelium’s digestive power and target it to decompose toxic wastes and…


Book cover of Arcadian America: The Death and Life of an Environmental Tradition

Catherine McNeur Author Of Taming Manhattan: Environmental Battles in the Antebellum City

From my list on histories of nature in unexpected places.

Why am I passionate about this?

Catherine McNeur is an award-winning historian, interested in the ways that issues of power impact how humans understand and transform their environments. She has long found the books, art, and other creative expressions that mischievously push at the edges of what we consider “nature” compelling, whether it’s a celebration of the beauty of weeds in an abandoned lot or nature writing on the flora in our guts. After having written about social and environmental battles in New York City, she is now researching the lives, work, and erasure of two forgotten female scientists from nineteenth-century Philadelphia. She lives in Oregon where she is a professor at Portland State University.

Catherine's book list on histories of nature in unexpected places

Catherine McNeur Why did Catherine love this book?

While some of us like to imagine humans as separate from nature, one moment where that boundary dissolves is with death. Inescapably, we will all eventually decompose and become a part of our environment. In Aaron Sach’s book, nineteenth-century Americans reckon with death through the creation of carefully landscaped cemeteries. What I particularly love about Arcadian America is how Sachs weaves his own memoir about his encounters with mortality in with the history he’s telling, making it a gripping page-turner.

By Aaron Sachs,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Arcadian America as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

How a forgotten environmental tradition of the pre-Civil War era may prove powerfully useful to us now

Perhaps America's best environmental idea was not the national park but the garden cemetery, a use of space that quickly gained popularity in the mid-nineteenth century. Such spaces of repose brought key elements of the countryside into rapidly expanding cities, making nature accessible to all and serving to remind visitors of the natural cycles of life. In this unique interdisciplinary blend of historical narrative, cultural criticism, and poignant memoir, Aaron Sachs argues that American cemeteries embody a forgotten landscape tradition that has much…


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Book cover of I Am Taurus

I Am Taurus By Stephen Palmer,

The constellation we know as Taurus goes all the way back to cave paintings of aurochs at Lascaux. This book traces the story of the bull in the sky, a journey through the history of what has become known as the sacred bull.

Each of the sections is written from…

Book cover of Sagebrush Empire: How a Remote Utah County Became the Battlefront of American Public Lands

Stephen Trimble Author Of The Capitol Reef Reader

From my list on Utah Canyon Country.

Why am I passionate about this?

Long ago, in college in Colorado, I discovered Edward Abbey’s Desert Solitaire—the classic that grew from journals he kept while a ranger at Utah’s Arches National Park. I’d grown up in the West, visiting national parks and revering park rangers. Abbey gave me the model—live and write in these wild places. After graduating, I snagged jobs myself as a seasonal ranger/naturalist at Arches and Capitol Reef national parks. I was thrilled. Since then, I’ve spent decades exploring and photographing Western landscapes. After working on 25 books about natural history, Native peoples, and conservation, Capitol Reef still remains my “home park” and Utah Canyon Country my spiritual home.  

Stephen's book list on Utah Canyon Country

Stephen Trimble Why did Stephen love this book?

Former president Trump’s evisceration of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments kept all of us canyon country activists busy for years with protests and op-eds. The backstory leading to President Biden’s restoration of both monuments pretty much outlines the history of conservation in America. Bears Ears and Grand Staircase, as well as Capitol Reef, were part of an enormous Escalante National Monument proposed in the 1930s that likely would have prevented the tragic flooding of Glen Canyon by Lake Powell. Jonathan Thompson recounts these historic fights over public lands by focusing on San Juan County, home to Canyonlands National Park and Bears Ears—the first preserve proposed by Native nations—bringing us right up to the 2020s. Controversies abound, and Thompson is an engaging storyteller and careful journalist.

By Jonathan P. Thompson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Sagebrush Empire as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Thompson's investigative chops are impressive."

—SIERRA MAGAZINE

San Juan County, Utah, contains some of the most spectacular landscapes in the world, rich in natural wonders and Indigenous culture and history. But it's also long been plagued with racism, bitterness, and politics as twisted as the beckoning canyons. In 2017, en route to the Valley of the Gods with his spouse, a Colorado man closed the gate on a corral. Two weeks later, the couple was facing felony charges. Award–winning journalist Jonathan P. Thompson places the case in its fraught historical context and—alongside personal stories from a life shaped by slickrock…


Book cover of Secret Place
Book cover of Old Pearl
Book cover of Finding Wild

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