Here are 100 books that Trees of Britain and Northern Europe fans have personally recommended if you like
Trees of Britain and Northern Europe.
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I am passionate about the selected books because they have a unique way of broadening one's horizons and inspiring change in life. Their diverse narratives and profound insights invite all of us to discover new perspectives, challenge our beliefs, and deepen our understanding of the world.
I enjoyed this book specifically because it illustrates trees as social creatures, talking and sharing with each other and building relationships. Peter Wohlleben really opened my eyes to the hidden underground network in forests.
The way Peter tells the story of trees' lives makes it so relatable. He tells the story of trees' unique lives in such an approachable and familiar way, describing how they "feel" pain, "taste" chemicals, and "hear" sounds.
I found the way Wohlleben animates complex scientific ideas through captivating prose most appealing. Deepening my personal relationship with nature.
"A paradigm-smashing chronicle of joyous entanglement that will make you acknowledge your own entanglement in the ancient and ever-new web of being."--Charles Foster, author of Being a Beast Are trees social beings? In this international bestseller, forester and author Peter Wohlleben convincingly makes the case that, yes, the forest is a social network. He draws on groundbreaking scientific discoveries to describe how trees are like human families: tree parents live together with their children, communicate with them, support them as they grow, share nutrients with those who are sick or struggling, and even warn each other of impending dangers. Wohlleben…
I’ve always wanted to travel and have always been obsessed with exploring the natural world with my camera. Over the past 30 years I’ve been lucky to film in 120+ countries and meet thousands of inspiring people in the most unlikely of places. Experience has taught me that there are certain core positive traits that unify us all and help bind us to the natural world within which we live. The books I’ve chosen remind me of how complicated, beautiful, and precious; and how full of wonder and mystery our planet is. They have helped inspire me to pack my bags and get out there to explore it for myself.
Chatwin’s classic is a must read for anyone interested in the concept of the human relationship with landscape and spirituality.
A deeply thoughtful book that made me think very hard about my own place in the world, about how I connect to and interact with nature, and where my life’s journey may be leading me. By focusing on the quality of journey the destination will take care of itself.
This Moleskine-bound edition is sold together with a blank Moleskine notebook, for recording your own thoughts and adventures. Perfect for the travel writers of the future.
The Songlines is Bruce Chatwin's magical account of his journey across the length and breadth of Australia, following the invisible and ancient pathways that are said to criss-cross the land. Chatwin recorded his travels in his favourite notebook, which he would usually buy in bulk in a particular stationery shop in Paris. But when the manufacturer went out of business, he was told "Le vrai moleskine n'est plus". A decade after its publication, on…
I’ve always wanted to travel and have always been obsessed with exploring the natural world with my camera. Over the past 30 years I’ve been lucky to film in 120+ countries and meet thousands of inspiring people in the most unlikely of places. Experience has taught me that there are certain core positive traits that unify us all and help bind us to the natural world within which we live. The books I’ve chosen remind me of how complicated, beautiful, and precious; and how full of wonder and mystery our planet is. They have helped inspire me to pack my bags and get out there to explore it for myself.
Newby’s adventure classic tells the story of two unassuming friends who decide to go mountaineering in one of the world’s most remote and forbidding regions.
This book helped show me that anything is possible; all you need is the positivity of spirit and focus of drive to take on seemingly overwhelming physical and mental challenges.
His self-deprecating humour and ability to communicate and share the grandeur and beauty of Afghanistan is a must read for anyone who would rather make up their own mind about an oft maligned and feared region of the world.
A classic of travel writing, A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush is Eric Newby's iconic account of his journey through one of the most remote and beautiful wildernesses on earth.
It was 1956, and Eric Newby was earning an improbable living in the chaotic family business of London haute couture. Pining for adventure, Newby sent his friend Hugh Carless the now-famous cable - CAN YOU TRAVEL NURISTAN JUNE? - setting in motion a legendary journey from Mayfair to Afghanistan, and the mountains of the Hindu Kush, north-east of Kabul.
Inexperienced and ill prepared (their preparations involved nothing more than…
I cannot remember a time when I wasn’t captured by nature. Growing up in coastal Devon, UK, I loved immersing myself, sometimes literally, in the landscapes and nature of my surroundings. It was inevitable I would become a biologist, and I think also inevitable that I would be drawn to the field of ecology, the study of the relationships that exist within nature. I have expanded my horizons over the past decade or so, developing a deep love for the landscapes and nature of southern Africa, but the rockpools and lanes of Devon are never far away.
I am a biologist and I have a passion, a deep love indeed, of the natural world. I always have. It boosts me and nurtures me–body, mind and spirit. But at the moment, with everything that is happening to the world, I think it is easy to lose hope.
Feral is everything you would expect from Monbiot–elegant prose and well thought out ideas building on solid knowledge. But it is more than that. It is a book that brings hope and makes me feel that, even if Monbiot’s vision isn’t the way, there most certainly is a way through the mess we are creating.
Positivity, action, hope–these are things we need more of right now.
To be an environmentalist early in the twenty-first century is always to be defending, arguing, acknowledging the hurdles we face in our efforts to protect wild places and fight climate change. But let’s be honest: hedging has never inspired anyone.
So what if we stopped hedging? What if we grounded our efforts to solve environmental problems in hope instead, and let nature make our case for us? That’s what George Monbiot does in Feral, a lyrical, unabashedly romantic vision of how, by inviting nature back into our lives, we can simultaneously cure our “ecological boredom” and begin repairing centuries of…
I'm a self-taught artist and sometimes a sculptor. I'm best known for illustrating the Discworld novels of Sir Terry Pratchett which I have been working on for almost 30 years. Not having had formal training, looking at the work of other artists was an important part of my learning. I have a large collection of art books and have been inspired by all sorts of creatives ranging from Leonardo Da Vinci to Jamie Hewlett. I'm often drawn to draughts-people who have a scientific approach to their work and limited use of colour. If I can’t escape to a gallery for inspiration I can always turn to the pages of a book.
This book contains exquisite pencil and ink drawings by Dr. Sarah Simblet who teaches at The Ruskin and Christ Church, at Oxford University. Her observational work is second to none and through it, she explores the relationship between science, history, and art. She is dedicated to sharing visual intelligence and promoting understanding through art. This is complemented perfectly with the text by Gabriel Hemery who gives an in-depth insight into the value of one of our most treasured assets – the trees of our land.
"Beautiful, useful, inspirational" BBC Wildlife Book of the Month
"A delight on every page" Evening Standard
In 1664, the horticulturist and diarist John Evelyn wrote Sylva, the first comprehensive study of British trees. It was also the world's earliest forestry book, and the first book ever published by the Royal Society. Evelyn's elegant prose has a lot to tell us today, but the world has changed dramatically since his day. Now authors Gabriel Hemery and Sarah Simblet, taking inspiration from the original work, have masterfully created a contemporary version - The New Sylva. The result is a fabulous resource that…
Trees have been important to me throughout my life. I was lucky to grow up surrounded by ancient woodland in the English countryside. When most of that woodland was felled in the 1970s it made me think deeply about the importance of plants to people. I was privileged later, to spend time with indigenous peoples in Latin America learning about what trees and plants mean to them. I now write about how plants are perceived and used. After several children's books I wrote Plants For People which describes the plants we use in our daily lives and Ancient Trees which celebrates tree species that live for over a thousand years.
I like this book because, while drawing on a number of other sources on this theme, it introduces us, in relatively few words per chapter,to the importance of a range of tree species to people, in a great variety of ways.
Selecting 80 species - from England’s ‘London Plane’ to the ‘Sugar Maple’ of Canada - the book takes us on a journey around the world, by geographical region, summarizing key botanical information about each one and giving us examples of its significance or uses, past and/or present, often surprising or little known.
Each chapter has been beautifully illustrated by Lucille Clerk.
"Beautiful to behold and to read" - THE SUNDAY TIMES
"An arboreal odyssey" - NATURE
"One of the most quietly beautiful books of the year" - DAILY MAIL
"Jonathan Drori's deep-seated love of nature is contagious in this tree-by-tree journey across countries and continents. A book to take your time over" - WIRED
Jonathan Drori's number one bestseller, now available in paperback!
Bestselling author and environmentalist Jonathan Drori follows in the footsteps of Phileas Fogg as he tells the stories of 80 magnificent trees from all over the globe.
In Around the World in 80 Trees, Jonathan Drori uses plant…
I’ve been getting kids out into nature as an environmental education professional for over 30 years, in the garden, in the mountains, at the seashore, and in nearby nature. My life’s work, whether I am writing or teaching, is to help people experience the wonder of the natural world. I believe that children and adults need access to nature to grow and thrive, to find peace in a busy world, and to connect with each other. I know that, just like weeds, we can find a way to navigate the challenges in our lives when we connect with nature’s sustaining goodness wherever we find it.
Behind weeds, trees are perhaps the most common plant many kids will encounter in their day to day lives, and another way children can access nature near home and school. And while trees are complex living things at the apex of the plant kingdom, they often are unnoticed and underappreciated. This beautiful lyrical picture book gives children a context to explore what a tree can do through kid-sized comparisons to what children can also do. Use it to help children explore one of the most common features of both urban and rural landscapes: trees.
Two siblings imagine life as a tree, and envision what they would hear, feel, and see.
If I were a tree, I know how I'd be. My trunk strong and wide, my limbs side to side, I'd stand towering tall, high above all, My leaves growing big, and buds on each twig. If I were a tree, that's how I'd be.
The sister has camped in the forest many times before. The brother is nervous for his first overnight trip. As the illustrations in this multifaceted picture book show the siblings discovering the woods, the text celebrates the strength and…
I know a book can change a person’s life because one of my early life-changing events was reading Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. From it, I took away the idea of how a fact is made, not discovered, and how facts, even those as “objective” as those in science, are different in different ages. It’s less a matter of one age being wrong about “Nature,” for example, than it is that a concept like “Nature” emerges out of a scrum of attitudes, technologies, conventions, etc.
I especially loved that this book has the ability to bring together elements as disparate as science, politics, and our common humanity. I repeatedly stopped reading to think about what was written: a depiction of our society and our place at the crossroads of possible futures that will depend on our attitudes to the plants and animals that make up the earth we share.
But the moral core at the center of this novel makes it more than just a good story. I kept thinking that it was easy to imagine Powers’s book as what many people believe is the “Great American Novel,” Moby-Dick, if we replace Melville’s whale with Powers’s trees and set it in the present instead of the 19th century.
The Overstory, winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, is a sweeping, impassioned work of activism and resistance that is also a stunning evocation of-and paean to-the natural world. From the roots to the crown and back to the seeds, Richard Powers's twelfth novel unfolds in concentric rings of interlocking fables that range from antebellum New York to the late twentieth-century Timber Wars of the Pacific Northwest and beyond. There is a world alongside ours-vast, slow, interconnected, resourceful, magnificently inventive, and almost invisible to us. This is the story of a handful of people who learn how to see…
I did a master's in Environmental Policy, and at the end of that year, I thought, "this is all very well, but there’s no point designing these policies if no one wants them." My response to the environmental crisis is to try to open people’s eyes to the beauty and wonder of Nature. If you pay close attention, you start to develop an expansive sense of the ordinary: Creation is stranger, more mysterious, and more wonderful than we can imagine. This in turn helps us to love the world more deeply, and we tend to look after things that we love.
This was the book that made me look again at trees, seeing them for the incredible organisms that they are. Deakin goes on an amazing adventure from Suffolk to Kazakhstan, Australia, and beyond, trying to get to the heart of why wood and trees have such profound meaning for us. If you like Wildwood, you could also try Waterlog, in which he wild-swims his way through the British Isles. He’s the perfect companion for the armchair adventurer, and a very genial writer.
Here, published for the first time in the United States, is the last book by Roger Deakin, famed British nature writer and icon of the environmentalist movement. In Deakin's glorious meditation on wood, the "fifth element" -- as it exists in nature, in our culture, and in our souls -- the reader accompanies Deakin through the woods of Britain, Europe, Kazakhstan, and Australia in search of what lies behind man's profound and enduring connection with trees.
Deakin lives in forest shacks, goes "coppicing" in Suffolk, swims beneath the walnut trees of the Haut-Languedoc, and hunts bushplums with Aboriginal women in…
At some point in our tweens, we learn that picture books are for children, and comic books are for nerds. I personally never heard it spoken aloud. It was more that thinly disguised looks of disapproval from adults delivered the message. As a graphic novelist, it sometimes feels like an uphill battle. I find pushing a reluctant ‘grown-up’ straight to graphic novels is perhaps a step too far. A start is an illustrated book. No speech bubbles. No comic book panels. Just illustrations supporting text, and text supporting illustrations. And sometimes, just sometimes, this opens the door to graphic novels.
This book is so evocative, a marriage of poetic words and nuanced illustrations so successful that when I first read it, it immediately took me back decades to my childhood and the old barn on my parents’ property. I could almost smell the pine trees through the barn boards, hear the birds nested in the rafters, and feel the summer sun on my face.
From Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Ted Kooser and Kate Greenaway winner Jon Klassen comes a poignant tale of loss, change and nature's quiet triumph.
From Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Ted Kooser and Jon Klassen, author-illustrator of the first ever title to win both the Kate Greenaway and Caldecott Medal, comes a lovely, lyrical exploration of loss, change and the natural world, and a story about a house over the passage of time. When the house was new, not a single tree remained on its perfect lawn to give shade from the sun. The children in the house trailed the scent of wild…
