Book Detective

From his childhood fascination with the gigantic Natural History Museum model of a blue whale to his adult encounters with the living animals in the Atlantic Ocean, the acclaimed writer Philip Hoare has been obsessed with whales. Journeying through human and natural history, The Whale is the result of his voyage of discovery into the heart of this obsession and the book that inspired it: Herman Melville's Moby-Dick.

Taking us deep into their domain, Hoare shows us these mysterious creatures as they have never been seen before. Following in Ishmael's footsteps, he explores the troubled history of man and whale; visits the historic whaling locales of New Bedford, Nantucket, and the Azores; and traces the whale's cultural history from Jonah to Free Willy. Winner of the prestigious BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction, The Whale is an unforgettable and often moving attempt to explain why these strange and beautiful animals still exert such a powerful hold on our imagination.

The Whale by Philip Hoare

American Buffalo by Steven Rinella

Coyote America: A Natural and Supernatural History by Dan Flores

Robbing the Bees by Holley Bishop

Superdove by Courtney Humphries

Eels by James Prosek

The Natural History of Unicorns by Chris Lavers

The Code Book by Simon Singh

The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan

The Gene: An Intimate History by Siddhartha Mukherjee

The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert

Cod by Mark Kurlansky

The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Kean

Salt by Mark Kurlansky

The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough

Hackers by Steven Levy

Fingerprints of the Gods by Graham Hancock

Magicians of the Gods by Graham Hancock

The Demon in the Freezer by Richard Preston

The Information by James Gleick