This book was amazing! Very surprised by the facts I learned from the book. The writer has a very engaging style that reads very comfortably. Not boring like an info dump non-fiction book.
If you're interested in the subject, a must-read.

BOOK REVIEW: Tapestries of Life by @anne_sverdrup_thygeson

4 Stars

Tapestries of Life looks into the relationship between humans and nature: how we need nature to survive and how nature inspires us. It also looks at devastating ways in which we are ruining the natural environment.

Did you know that we are one of 10 million species on earth, but that only 1.5 million of these species have been named? Think of how crazy it is that all the damage to all those 10 million species has been done by ONE species...humans.
This book is split up nicely into 10 brilliant chapters, each of which is incredibly interesting and holds no repetition.
I especially found the chapter on medicine in nature both amazing and horrifying. I was shocked to learn that to this day, we use the blue blood of horseshoe crabs (which are hung up and drained in labs like blood bags) to find bacteria within new vaccines. These remarkable prehistoric looking animals have been alive for millions of years and are now endangered due to the impact of humans. I was VERY pleased to learn that we have now found a synthetic way of doing the job of this bacteria finding blue blood and that it will be able to be used within a few years.
That is obviously a very sad way in which we use nature for our own gain but there are also lots of fascinating and harmless ways we interact too. For instance, the front of the bullet trains in Japan were modelled off the streamlined way in which a kingfisher's beak enters water.
The book is well balanced and bursting with interesting facts and useful information. I have learnt a lot and really enjoyed reading it. The writing is both useful and engaging which is a hard balance in nature books. I will definitely read this author's books again (Her Insects book is actually sat on my TBR cart!).

It is obvious that we cannot live without nature but nature is certainly better off without us. I highly recommend this book to anyone that is interested in learning about our relationship with nature.

Please note that I was #gifted this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

We all know about the lotus effect being applied to windows and cars, but did you know about bees, wasps and yeast? Do you know which organisms are responsible for cleaning water and air? Did you know that the Shikansen design is adapted from a bird's beak?

This book is about all the tiny details, as in the devil is in the detail, that we <i>need</i> for life as we know it. How it is changing, raising awareness for how dependent we really are to all that surrounds us - even in cities where nothing non-manmade seems to surround us.

I loved this book and already recommended it to a friend. I learned many fun facts, and finally was told what happens when a whale dies: It's called whalefall, and can take decades until the carcass reaches it's final resting place at the bottom of the ocean. All the way down, it will provide feed for multiple species.

I love how the author does not seem to be lecturing, but is nerding out and invites you to join.
There are no footnotes, but each chapter is divided in smaller sub-chapters and you can view the sources for each subchapter at the end of the book.
This book reminded me of how fun non fiction can be, and that I want to make more space in my life for that.

The arc was provided by the publisher.

Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson is a Norwegian scientist specialising in biodiversity. This book - her second - focuses on our relationship with nature, and the wonders it contains. The book is structured in very short chapters, loosely on the same themes, and she covers many different topics: freshwater pearl mussels ("the caretakers who clean our waterways"), crops, lawns and their ecological poverty (honestly... they aren't even that pretty and they bring nothing to the table), biopiracy (big pharmaceutical companies harvesting indigenous remedies to create new medicines without giving back to the communities they took that knowledge from), trees, insects, the consequences of the loss of habitat of many species (the pangolin and Covid-19 appear), fungi and their incredible networks, mangrove forests and how they help protect us from the ravages of tsunamis... There is a lot in this book, it is a bit like reading a Cabinet of Curiosities. I found it engaging and pleasant to read, poetic at times, and the transation (by Lucy Moffat) is flawless. Would highly recommend.

Stocked with awing and sometimes slightly appalling facts - from the avocado-feasting habits of the sadly-extinct giant sloths to frog species that projectile vomit up their young to the epidemic of 'ecological grief' - Tapestries of Life is as enlightening as it is enjoyable, floating you through studies of particular specimens and explanations of ecological phenomena with easy-to-follow expositions and surprisingly humorous effect. Sverdrup-Thygeson's endeared narration of the flabbergasting wonders of the natural world and how its elements and procedures weave into our own systems and reciprocities is energetic and enlivening, and serves as a fantastic first encounter with such subjects (or an extremely welcome pick-me-up in a period where many of us found ourselves shut in our homes for prolonged stretches and unable to escape in search of a haven in wilder environments).

Thank you to NetGalley and HarperCollins UK (Nonfiction) for kindly passing on this ARC! 💫

Tapestries of Life is a book brimming with sparkling stories about our interaction with nature. You and I are woven into nature's wickerwork, much denser than you think. Millions of species give us food, medicine and a livable environment, in addition to nature giving us knowledge and joy. In an engaging way, Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson tells exciting and thought-provoking stories about nature. The author takes us out into the rainforest, where the orchid bees make perfume and pollinate the nuts you eat at Christmas. Into the cool shade under the big trees of the city streets, the ones that make us need less air cooling.

Down in the trenches where the soldiers used luminescent mushrooms as lanterns on moonless nights. We get to read about trees in the old forest that give us cancer medicine and the kingfisher that inspired the construction of light rail. But also about how our conduct can endanger all this. Because in our ability to exploit nature, there is also the risk of undermining our own livelihood. We are talking today about a natural crisis, where species are threatened and habitats disappear - a crisis as acute and serious as the climate crisis. If we are to secure our own future, we must change the way we live. We must learn to play on a team alongside the natural world and become as symbiotic with mother nature as possible.