Here are 99 books that Collins Complete British Insects fans have personally recommended if you like
Collins Complete British Insects.
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As a UK nature writer and amateur naturalist, I have a fascination with the natural world. If it squeaks, buzzes, croaks, hisses, or tweets, I want to know more about it. I enjoy books that are both captivating and easy to understand, and I’m at my happiest when uncovering unusual facts and exploring the rich folklore surrounding our wildlife. As a writer, I contribute to magazines focusing on nature and wildlife-friendly gardening. I also teach creative writing and have authored a book celebrating the wonders of our UK wildlife. I live in Dorset and find endless joy in observing and nurturing whatever wanders or flies into my overgrown garden.
I’m a big fan of books that teach me something, and this book does it 365 days of the year with the most fantastic writing.
I got into the habit of reading this book every day, then going out and searching for the wildlife. I love that it doesn’t concentrate on hard-to-see or rare creatures. You really feel as if he’s written each page just for you.
A fascinating, inspiring gift book that helps you make the most of nature, with something to spot for every day of the year.
A fascinating, inspiring gift book that helps you make the most of nature, with something to spot for every day of the year.
This book proves that nature isn't something you visit from time to time; it's everywhere - even in the densest concrete jungle. You can find nearly all of the natural wonders in this book within a mile of your front door. There are 365 to look for - one for every day of year,…
The Victorian mansion, Evenmere, is the mechanism that runs the universe.
The lamps must be lit, or the stars die. The clocks must be wound, or Time ceases. The Balance between Order and Chaos must be preserved, or Existence crumbles.
Appointed the Steward of Evenmere, Carter Anderson must learn the…
As a UK nature writer and amateur naturalist, I have a fascination with the natural world. If it squeaks, buzzes, croaks, hisses, or tweets, I want to know more about it. I enjoy books that are both captivating and easy to understand, and I’m at my happiest when uncovering unusual facts and exploring the rich folklore surrounding our wildlife. As a writer, I contribute to magazines focusing on nature and wildlife-friendly gardening. I also teach creative writing and have authored a book celebrating the wonders of our UK wildlife. I live in Dorset and find endless joy in observing and nurturing whatever wanders or flies into my overgrown garden.
This was the first wildlife reference book I ever owned, and I’ve never regretted buying it.
I still use it most days to identify birds on the bird feeder or bats flying over my house. It also includes great photos, which I personally prefer to drawings. This is a little gem that I have spent hours flicking through.
A comprehensive and heavily illustrated guide to every species of British wildlife, this book is the definitive photographic reference guide for nature enthusiasts.
Collins Complete Guide to British Wildlife allows everyone to identify the wildlife found in Britain and Ireland. The book is illustrated with beautiful photographs throughout, featuring the mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians and invertebrates you are most likely to see, as well as all the common plants.
By only covering Britain and Ireland, fewer species are included than in many broader European guides, making it quicker and easier for the reader to accurately identify what they have…
As a UK nature writer and amateur naturalist, I have a fascination with the natural world. If it squeaks, buzzes, croaks, hisses, or tweets, I want to know more about it. I enjoy books that are both captivating and easy to understand, and I’m at my happiest when uncovering unusual facts and exploring the rich folklore surrounding our wildlife. As a writer, I contribute to magazines focusing on nature and wildlife-friendly gardening. I also teach creative writing and have authored a book celebrating the wonders of our UK wildlife. I live in Dorset and find endless joy in observing and nurturing whatever wanders or flies into my overgrown garden.
When the book was published, I couldn't wait to read it. I love reading about nature, especially bees, and also learning a few fascinating facts along the way, and this book didn’t disappoint.
It’s beautifully written by Brigit. I nearly read it in one sitting, as the chapters flow so temptingly from subject to subject.
A naturalist's passionate dive into the lives of bees (of all stripes) and the natural world in her own backyard
Brigit Strawbridge Howard was shocked the day she realised she knew more about the French Revolution than she did about her native trees. And birds. And wildflowers. And bees. The thought stopped her-quite literally-in her tracks. But that day was also the start of a journey, one filled with silver birches and hairy-footed flower bees, skylarks, and rosebay willow herb, and the joy that comes with…
The Guardian of the Palace is the first novel in a modern fantasy series set in a New York City where magic is real—but hidden, suppressed, and dangerous when exposed.
When an ancient magic begins to leak into the world, a small group of unlikely allies is forced to act…
As a UK nature writer and amateur naturalist, I have a fascination with the natural world. If it squeaks, buzzes, croaks, hisses, or tweets, I want to know more about it. I enjoy books that are both captivating and easy to understand, and I’m at my happiest when uncovering unusual facts and exploring the rich folklore surrounding our wildlife. As a writer, I contribute to magazines focusing on nature and wildlife-friendly gardening. I also teach creative writing and have authored a book celebrating the wonders of our UK wildlife. I live in Dorset and find endless joy in observing and nurturing whatever wanders or flies into my overgrown garden.
I’m onto my second copy of this little book, as the first copy fell to bits from so much use. Though it’s a field guide, it’s not only easy to read and understand (even with my unscientific mind) but also full of useful little titbits of information.
Every spring, I can’t wait to take it off the bookshelf and use it to identify the enormous queen bumblebees emerging from hibernation in the garden.
I am a scientist studying the evolution of insect communities for years. I am fascinated by their high degree of cooperation and how these animals make collective decisions. But I also observe social parasitic ants that raid other colonies and make their workers work for them. This tension between altruistic cooperation on the one hand and violence and war, on the other hand, is common to human and insect societies, even if they evolved in completely different ways. I hope that when you read the books I recommend here, you will be as fascinated as I am by these parallel universes and perhaps next time you will see an ant with different eyes.
I'm an ant researcher, so perhaps it's not surprising that I'm recommending an ant book. But this book is less about the short essays, which do a great job of describing the biology of these social animals, and more about the photos. Most people overlook ants because they are so tiny, but when you enlarge them, as in this book, they show their real beauty. When I received my copy, I was amazed and I have seen many ants up close. But the sheer variety of morphological structures, faces, and yes, even colors. Not all ants are black or red, there are even ants that shimmer in all the colors of the rainbow.
We notice mostly ant workers, but in this book also the males are represented, and they often look out-worldly, so not at all like we imagine ants. A book that shows the aesthetics of these social animals…
Nature's most successful insects captured in remarkable macrophotography
In Ants,
photographer Eduard Florin Niga brings us incredibly close to the most
numerous animals on Earth, whose ability to organize colonies,
communicate among themselves, and solve complex problems has made them
an object of endless fascination. Among the more than 30 species
photographed by Niga are leafcutters that grow fungus for food, trap-jaw
ants with fearsome mandibles, bullet ants with potent stingers,
warriors, drivers, gliders, harvesters, and the pavement ants that are
always underfoot. Among his most memorable images are
portraits-including queens, workers, soldiers, and rarely seen
males-that bring the reader…
I’ve spent 20 years researching Antarctica and polar history to learn about my father’s experiences on Admiral Richard E. Byrd’s III expedition or the USASE in 1939-41. I’ve been passionate about art, travel, and learning about other cultures for most of my life. I’m excited to say, I’ve worked on all the continents! My interests led me to a career as a leadership consultant, executive coach and team facilitator. Since 2020, I have had a dream job working with Antarctic scientists and teams, assisting them to manage stress and conflict in the field. With a lifetime of experience in the performing arts, my work inspires leaders to unlock their full potential and drive meaningful change.
I’ve never seen anything like this body of work—it’s mesmerizing to see Brian Jarvi’s paintings and thought process behind his 17-year creation. It makes me celebrate Nature as he intended and I feel awe for the realism he depicts.
As I read, I witness the conversation that must be taking place between animals and humanity to shape the future on our planet.
Depicting more than 220 African species, the stunning large-scale mural African Menagerie is artist Brian Jarvi s masterwork. Lavishly reproduced in an oversize format with a gatefold, this book brings this landscape masterpiece to the conservationist, lover of Africa, and fan of wildlife art. In oversized colour reproductions, the book African Menagerie offers readers a look at the finer details of the realist renderings of the animals and birds across the seven panels and thirty feet. There are also reproductions of the animal studies Jarvi created in the seventeen years leading up to the final work. Measuring 28 feet across…
Aury and Scott travel to the Finger Lakes in New York’s wine country to get to the bottom of the mysterious happenings at the Songscape Winery. Disturbed furniture and curious noises are one thing, but when a customer winds up dead, it’s time to dig into the details and see…
I have always been fascinated by the workings of the human mind.What instincts and influences make us who we are? This Alien Shore grew out of research I was doing into atypical neurological conditions.It depicts a society that has abandoned the concept of “neurotypical”, embracing every variant of human perspective as valid and valuable. One of my main characters, Kio Masada, is autistic, and that gives him a unique perspective on computer security that others cannot provide. What might such a man accomplish, in a world where his condition is embraced and celebrated? Good science fiction challenges our definition of “Other,” and asks what it really means to be human, all in the context of an exciting story.
This anthology has one of my favorite stories by Tiptree, it is called "We who stole the dream". The Joilani have long been enslaved and abused by humans. So has another race, of “delicately winged creatures”, whose sweat is a powerful intoxicant to humans. It is most potent when the donor experiences pain and fear, so humans have taken to torturing mated pairs of them, so the partners can watch each other suffer. The resulting sweat is a drug called Star Tears. Although that unnamed race plays no active role in the story, they are on my list because of the powerful manner in which they influence other species, invoking the darkest and most brutal aspects of human nature simply by existing.
The diminutive, weak, and peace-loving Joilani make a desperate break for freedom. Stealing a spaceship called The Dream, they seek out the mythical planet of their…
Ten tantalizing tales of man, woman and child - and their cosmic connections...
Contents: Angel Fix (1974) Beaver Tears (1976) Your Faces, O My Sisters! Your Faces Filled of Light! (1976) The Screwfly Solution (1977) Time-Sharing Angel (1977) We Who Stole the Dream (1978) Slow Music (1980) A Source of Innocent Merriment (1980) Out of the Everywhere (1981) With Delicate Mad Hands (1981)
I’ve been reading science fiction and fantasy, and specifically space opera, since I was seven and first discovered The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet. I read my way through every book in the school library and public library that dealt with aliens, space travel, starships, and especially adventure.
Esen is a shapechanger, a young one. While exploring a world considered ‘safe’ by her matriarch, she is captured by the natives. Her only hope of rescue is to betray her species' strict rules and reveal her true nature to her fellow prisoner, a human.
I adore Esen as a character. She is very relatable. I also love the breadth and scope of species and habitats and worlds in this series. Julie Czerneda is one of my favorite authors. Her storytelling skills shine. Esen is definitely not human, but Czerneda creates such a warm character you can’t help but love her. Beholder’s Eye is part coming-of-age but mostly a darn good science fiction adventure.
United in their natural form they are one, sharing all their memories, experiences, and lives. Apart they are six, the only existing members of their ancient race, a species with the ability to assume any form once they understand its essence.
Their continued survival in a universe filled with races ready to destroy anyone perceived as different is based on the Rules. And first among those Rules is: Never reveal your true nature to another being. But when the youngest among them, Esen-alit-Quar, receives her first independent assignment to a world considered safe to explore, she stumbles into a trap…
Growing up, I was exposed to the same influences as most other SF writers of my generation – Clarke, Heinlein, and Asimov. But I was also exposed to the more nuanced, more psychologically realistic work of writers like Harlan Ellison, Norman Spinrad, Ursula K. LeGuin, and J.G. Ballard, none of whom shared the unquestioning techno-utopianism of an earlier generation of writers. They taught me not to automatically respect power or authority, and to always question ideas that might otherwise be taken for granted. It’s an approach that’s carried over into my own writing ever since.
I first read Pohl’s Jem when I was a kid, and his fatalistic, even cynical take on first contact and interstellar colonization, along with the works of Harlan Ellison, Philip K. Dick, and Ursula LeGuin, greatly informed my developing views on politics and society. A near-future Earth divided into three major power blocs discovers a world ripe for exploitation and populated by not one, but three, sentient species, It’s not long before each bloc is currying the favor of different species in order to set each against the other, with absolutely no one thinking beyond their own immediate needs or with any concern about the consequences of their actions.
A cynical and compelling tale of politics, exploitation and colonisation on another planet
The discovery of another habitable world might spell salvation to the three bitterly competing power blocs of the resource-starved 21st century; but when their representatives arrive on Jem, with its multiple intelligent species, they discover instead the perfect situation into which to export their rivalries.
Subtitled, with savage irony, 'The Making of a Utopia', JEM is one of Frederik Pohl's most powerful novels.
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
I’ve been a non-fiction writer my entire career and I love learning new things and then sharing them with readers in an approachable and engaging way, as these books do. These books encourage curiosity and that kind of “Oh! I didn’t know that!” response, which can spark a young reader to dig deeper and even share their new knowledge with others.
This book is much meatier than the others on the list. But it also delivers information in easy-to-digest blocks and is filled with amazing photographs, many of which the author himself took.
This book provides information that corrects some myths or misunderstandings that people have about sharks.
Dive into the wild world of sharks! Get up close to learn the truth behind these fantastic, ferocious fish with famed National Geographic photographer and explorer Brian Skerry.
Join this amazing underwater adventure to track the sharks of the world, from the teeniest dogfish to the everfeared great white. This ultimate book features every species of shark on the planet, with awesome photos, fascinating facts, the latest science, and firsthand stories of real-life encounters with these incredible creatures. Learn how sharks live, how they eat, the challenges they face, and whether or not you are actually on the menu.
