Member articles

Rectangular photo of Lisa Baril’s office bookshelf with titles on archaeology, ice, glaciers, climate change, and writing a book proposal. Photo credit Lisa Baril.

Lisa Baril—The Age of Melt: What Glaciers, Ice Mummies, and Ancient Artifacts Teach Us about Climate, Culture, and a Future Without Ice

As the climate warms, perennial patches of ice and snow in mountain ranges around the world melt, exposing artifacts hidden for 100s, even 1000s of years. After travels to Norway, the Alps, the Andes, and around the US, Lisa Baril tells what archeologists have found in The Age of Melt: What Glaciers, Ice Mummies, and Ancient Artifacts Teach Us about Climate, Culture, and a Future Without Ice.

Rectangular photo of Sneed B. Collard’s office bookshelf with books on birds, sea turtles, frogs and toads, whales, and other species, as well as environments, such as the coral reef and forests. Photo credit Sneed B. Collard III.

Sneed B. Collard III—Defending Nature: How the Military Protects Threatened and Endangered Species

Military bases often serve as islands of biodiversity. Nearly 500 threatened or endangered species live on US military bases, more than in US National Parks, Sneed Collard III reports in Defending Nature: How the US Military Protects Threatened and Endangered Species. In this book for readers ages 9-14, Collard focuses on three at-risk species and the biologists and others working to save them.

Rectangular photo of Lynne Peeples’ office bookshelf with titles on body clocks, sleep, and circadian science. Photo credit Lynne Peeples.

Lynne Peeples—The Inner Clock: Living in Sync with Our Circadian Rhythms

Smartphones, daylight saving time, jet travel, shiftwork, lighting, and other aspects of modern life disrupt biological clocks that govern sleep and alertness, appetite, mood, response to medications, and other bodily functions, Lynne Peeples writes in The Inner Clock: Living in Sync with Our Circadian Rhythms. Paying more attention to body time, she asserts, could improve health and happiness.

Rectangular photo of Charlotte Moser’s office bookshelf showing books on vaccines, virology, polio, smallpox, risks, and science communication. Photo credit: Charlotte Moser

Paul A. Offit, MD, and Charlotte A. Moser (NASW Member)—Vaccines and Your Family: Separating Fact from Fiction, 2nd Ed.

Why do we still need vaccines? How do I sort out the good information about vaccines from the bad? Isn’t it better to be naturally infected than immunized? In Vaccines and Your Family: Separating Fact from Fiction, 2nd Ed., Paul A. Offit, MD, and NASW member Charlotte A. Moser, of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Vaccine Education Center provide a broad overview of current vaccine topics.

Rectangular photo of Sneed B. Collard’s office bookshelf with books on birds of America, Europe, Central America, and elsewhere, along with books on bird biology. Photo credit Sneed B. Collard III.

Sneed B. Collard III—Birding for Boomers: And Everyone Else Brave Enough to Embrace the World’s Most Rewarding and Frustrating Activity

“One of the first great things about birds: they are everywhere,” Sneed B. Collard III writes in Birding for Boomers—and Everyone Else Brave Enough to Embrace the World’s Most Rewarding and Frustrating Activity. Collard offers tips for new birders on binoculars, field guides, and bird ID apps, coping with age-related hearing/vision loss, birding travel destinations, and bird conservation.

Rectangular photo of Sadie Dingfelder’s office bookshelf with titles on memory, face perception, cognitive neuroscience, and self-discovery. Photo credit Sadie Dingfelder

Sadie Dingfelder—Do I Know You? A Faceblind Reporter’s Journey into the Science of Sight, Memory, and Imagination

Sadie Dingfelder scolded a man in a grocery store for choosing the wrong item. She mistook him for her husband. After she learned she is faceblind, her reportorial instincts kicked in. In Do I Know You? A Faceblind Reporter's Journey into the Science of Sight, Memory, and Imagination, she says she’s learned how to cope: “If I pay close attention and ask the right questions, I’ll figure it out.”

Rectangular photo of Ferris Jabr’s office bookshelf with titles about evolution, climate change, plants, and the history of life on a shelf containing fossils, acorns and seed pods. Photo credit Ferris Jabr.

Ferris Jabr—Becoming Earth: How Our Planet Came to Life

Over billions of years, life forms from microbes to mammoths transformed continents, oceans, and the atmosphere, Ferris Jabr reports in Becoming Earth: How Our Planet Came to Life. To explore this process, Jabr visited a former gold mine a mile underground, now a science lab; an Arctic region once home to megafauna; and a 1066-ft tall observatory for global climate studies in the Amazon rainforest.

Rectangular photo of Sneed B. Collard III’s office bookshelf with titles on birds, butterflies, lizards, and other species, as well as on Darwin and the natural environment. Photo credit Sneed B. Collard III.

Sneed B. Collard III—Like No Other: Earth’s Coolest One-of-a-Kind Creatures

The Australian platypus, though a mammal, lays eggs. Whale sharks, the world’s longest fish, may be 60 ft long. New Zealand’s kakapo, the world’s largest parrot, can’t fly, Sneed B. Collard III reports in Like No Other: Earth’s Coolest One-of-a-Kind Creatures. Collard, author of nearly 100 science books for young readers, includes additional resources and exercises in this amply-illustrated book.

Rectangular photo of office bookshelf of Wendy Lyons Sunshine, author of Tender Paws: How Science-Based Parenting Can Transform Our Relationship with Dogs, showing books on dog training, behavior, and care, as well as child development, treatment of childhood trauma, attachment theory, and neuroscience. Photo credit: Wendy Lyons Sunshine.

Wendy Lyons Sunshine—Tender Paws: How Science-Based Parenting Can Transform Our Relationship with Dogs

Introducing a puppy or traumatized rescue dog to your home often presents unexpected challenges: some are nippy, fearful, or constant barkers. Tactics that help at-risk kids also may improve dog behavior, Wendy Lyons Sunshine asserts in Tender Paws: How Science-Based Parenting Can Transform Our Relationship with Dogs. To change behavior, she says, one first needs to assess a dog’s unmet needs.