Editor'sChoice

One World: The Ethics of Globalization
By Peter Singer
Yale University Press, 235 pages, $21.95
The choices we make in our daily lives can profoundly affect people on the other side of the globe. When we switch to vehicles that use more fuel than the ones we previously drove, we are contributing to climate change in Mozambique and Bangladesh: Crops may fail there, sea levels may rise, and tropical diseases may spread. Fasten your seat belts—this book is not for the faint of heart. Philosopher Peter Singer holds a mirror to the policies of the wealthiest nation-state—the United States—and the reflection is not flattering. He challenges us as a nation and as individuals on the issues of the environment, global economies, human rights, and foreign aid. In this morally compelling work, Singer calls for a new ethic that will serve the interests of all who live on the planet. Singer's erudition is accessible, his thesis persuasive. How well we come through the era of globalization—and, perhaps, whether we come through it at all—says Singer, will depend on how we respond ethically to the idea that we live in one world.

—Sydney Horton

The Eye of the Albatross
By Carl Safina
Henry Holt and Company, 377 pages, $27.50
Since albatrosses live at sea for most of their lives, coming ashore only to breed on remote islands, the average person is unlikely to meet one. Carl Safina makes a long journey into the North Pacific, to an albatross-breeding island, to introduce us to these pelagic birds. He guides us on a quest to understand the creatures that share the albatross's world: sharks, turtles, fish, people. Safina, the founder of Audubon's Living Oceans program, shines as a chronicler of oceanic science, presenting a world of evolutionary efficiency through albatross foraging and breeding. His energetic depictions of ocean creatures delight and inspire. But the surprises of this book are its outstanding portraits of humans: the scientists studying the animals and the fishermen who share their ocean. As fishermen try to prevent birds from dying on their hooks and scientists learn more about albatross life histories, people have new opportunities to protect the marine ecosystem. Above all, Safina's book reminds us that even the remotest parts of the ocean are not immune to our presence.

—Nancy Olmstead

Searching for Steinbeck's Sea of Cortez
By Andromeda Romano-Lax
Sasquatch Books, 254 pages, $16.95
This is Andromeda Romano-Lax's rather personal account of her attempt to retrace John Steinbeck's steps through Baja California, which the famous writer describes in his Log From the Sea of Cortez. Mexico's environmental-protection regulations are not well enforced, and Romano-Lax and her husband set out to update the catalogue of marine species compiled by Steinbeck's team in 1940. The family begin aboard a cramped old sailboat with a disgruntled brother-in-law as captain, and move on to hitchhiking and kayaking with a pair of toddlers. Despite scorpion attacks, the clan, of course, survives the unpredictable sea. The book is propelled by this family drama, although it never veers far from its more scholarly objective. The species encountered by Romano-Lax and her analysis of both the sea's environmental preservation and its degradation provide an intriguing and informative portrait of this harsh environment.

—Alyssa Worsham

The Future of Life
By Edward O. Wilson
Alfred A. Knopf, 229 pages, $22
E.O. Wilson brings a lifetime of biological study to bear on humanity's most pressing question: How do you raise the poor to a decent standard of living worldwide while preserving as much of the rest of life as possible? We are in a unique position to solve the problem, he writes, because we are the brain of the biosphere; our role can be thought of as that of the planet's keystone species, whose presence affects all other organisms. Ultimately, he argues, it is in our own self-interest—and genetic code—to act for the benefit of earth's long-term biological future. Although the book lays out the disastrous facts of our species' impacts on the rest of life, Wilson's overall assessment of the future is "guardedly optimistic." His solutions resist political ideology and provide an inspirational blueprint for change.

—Nancy Olmstead

ForFamilies

Project Puffin
By Stephen W. Kress, as told to Pete Salmansohn
Tilbury House, 40 pages, $7.95, ages 7 to 11
Puffins are adorable!" exclaim the authors of this delightful book. "With those large, colorful beaks, their upright posture, and their dark soulful eyes, it's easy to see why." Puffins also headline one of the great comebacks in conservation history, thanks to the vision and effort of Kress, who has led Audubon's Puffin Project since he founded it in 1973. Dramatic photos, most of them by Kress, and entertaining text by Salmansohn (an Audubon educator), convey the excitement of puffin restoration in coastal Maine, where these birds had been almost extinct for a century.

Saving Birds: Heroes Around the World
By Pete Salmansohn and Stephen W. Kress
Tilbury House, 40 pages, $16.95, all ages
If there's one thing children need, it's hope and heroes. Salmansohn and Kress give both in this stirring tribute to six herculean efforts around the world to rescue bird species from the brink of extinction. Meet everyone from villagers in Bojiwan, China, who confront farmers and plant trees to benefit black-necked cranes, to campesinos in the cloudforests of Chiapas, Mexico, who put on puppet shows to inspire the protection of quetzals. "These people," the authors write, "roll up their sleeves, do what has to be done, and have faith that their actions will make a difference."

Pumpkin Circle
By George Levenson; photography by Schmuel Thaler
Tricycle Press, 40 pages, $14.95, ages 4 to adult
Make every day halloween with this ode to the pumpkin. The author traces the pumpkin's life cycle—from seed to fruit and back to earth—with sensitivity to the creatures hitching rides: "Butterflies and spiders, grasshoppers and snails, explore the pumpkin garden as they travel private trails." Luscious photographs, showing the garden at its greenest and pumpkins at their orangest, offer a cornucopia of visual treats.

Song for the Whooping Crane
By Eileen Spinelli; illustrated by Elsa Warnick
Eerdmans Books, 32 pages, $16, all ages
Some cranes spiral from the clouds, and some cranes skim, and one crane—look!—reckless with delight, dives downward on a whim." Spinelli's heartfelt paean to the whooping crane follows this endangered species through four seasons. Warnick's elegant watercolors capture the majesty of whooping cranes in a variety of natural settings, from their soaring flights in moonlight to their gentle descents into wetlands.

Cave
By Diane Siebert; illustrations by Wayne McLoughlin
HarperCollins, 32 pages, $16.95, all ages
Sounding sort of like an underground Robert Frost, Siebert leads a magical journey: "I am the cave, so cool and dark / Where time, unending, leaves its mark / As natural forces build and hone / A crystal world from weeping stone." Siebert explores dark, deep chambers decorated with great crystallized columns—"like castles in a wonderland"—and introduces us to bats, spiders, and other mysterious creatures. McLoughlin's luminous paintings have an almost three-dimensional quality.

—David Seideman

© 2002  NASI

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