Eight Bears: Mythic Past and Imperiled Future

Dickie, Gloria

ISBN 10: 1324086998 / ISBN 13: 9781324086994

Published by W. W. Norton & Company (edition ), 2024

About this Item

It's a well-cared-for item that has seen limited use. The item may show minor signs of wear. All the text is legible, with all pages included. It may have slight markings and/or highlighting.

Seller Inventory # 1324086998-8-1

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Eight Bears: Mythic Past and Imperiled Future
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company (edition )
• Publication Date: 2024
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1324086998
• ISBN 13: 9781324086994
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: Very Good

About this title

Synopsis

Shortlisted for the Banff Centre Mountain Book Awards

Named a Best Book of the Year by The New Yorker, Economist, and Science News • A Scientific American Staff Favorite

"Vivid and engrossing.…[A] celebration of beardom." ―Richard Adams Carey, Wall Street Journal

A global exploration of the eight remaining species of bears―and the dangers they face.

Bears have always held a central place in our collective memory, from Indigenous folklore and Greek mythology to nineteenth-century fairytales and the modern toy shop. But as humans and bears come into ever-closer contact, our relationship nears a tipping point. Today, most of the eight remaining bear species are threatened with extinction. Some, such as the panda bear and the polar bear, are icons of the natural world; others, such as the spectacled bear and the sloth bear, are far less known.

In Eight Bears, journalist Gloria Dickie embarks on a globe-trotting journey to explore each bear’s story, whisking readers from the cloud forests of the Andes to the ice floes of the Arctic; from the jungles of India to the backwoods of the Rocky Mountain West. She meets with key figures on the frontlines of modern conservation efforts―the head of a rescue center for sun and moon bears freed from bile farms, a biologist known as Papa Panda, who has led China’s panda-breeding efforts for almost four decades, a conservationist retraining a military radar system to detect and track polar bears near towns―to reveal the unparalleled challenges bears face as they contend with a rapidly changing climate and encroaching human populations.

Weaving together ecology, history, mythology, and a captivating account of her travels and observations, Dickie offers a closer look at our volatile relationship with these magnificent mammals. Engrossing and deeply reported, Eight Bears delivers a clear warning for what we risk losing if we don’t learn to live alongside the animals that have shaped our cultures, geographies, and stories.

8 illustrations

About the Author

Gloria Dickie is a global climate and environment correspondent at Reuters News Agency. Her writing has been published in the New York Times, the Guardian, National Geographic, Scientific American, and the Atlantic, among other publications. Originally from Ontario, Canada, she lives in London, England.