Customer Reviews

Living Planet: Preserving Edens of the Earth

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2 star:		(1)
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This is an absolute must for those who enjoy the outdoors and care about the environment. The photography is nothing short of awesome, and the cause (World Wildlife Fund) is worthy of support. This is a great coffee table book and would make an excellent gift.

The wonderful photographs in this book can actually distract the reader from its message-- that rich animal and plant diversity occurs all over the world, not just in the tropical rain forest but in the Artic, the tops of mountains and banks of rivers. The book also comes with a phenomonal wall map you can display separately from the book.

World Wildlife Fund and its staff should be complimented for pulling together such an compelling tribute and call to action. Living Planet is a lot more then just another table-top photo book and its great gift for all sorts of people.

It would be difficult indeed to over-estimate the sheer beauty of the photographs printed on the pages of Living Planet. Of course the three photographers were off to a great start as the subject matter they are presenting is riveting. There are so many truly exotic (and still unspoiled) locales explored here. And so many diverse, truly impressive plant and animal forms documented.

But these three gifted photographers are superbly inspired practioners and so they are able to elevate the naturally exalted to an entirely new level of organisation. This is accomplished specifically, at least in part, by the use of super-saturated color in combination with consistently fresh and geometrically complex composition. The results, printed with great care by Crown Publishers, are extraordinary!

The photography is so visually stunning that it is easy to forget the purpose of this book which was published by the World Wildlide Fund. Thus the text, which is teeming with information, emphasises not the beauty of what has been captured on film. Rather it focuses on the steadily progressing ecological nightmare as humans-induced species extinction of animal and plant life proceeds around the globe in an unchecked and relentless manner. To quote briefly from the introduction by Walter Cronkite, "Earth is losing one-hundred species of animals, plants, insects and fungi every day. Experts estimate that the world has lost one-third of its biological wealth over the last thirty years." Astonishing facts the sobriety of which contrasts mightily with the visual celebration of life as depicted in this wonderfully elegant volume.

It was interesting to note that this book is among several top 10's in science. It must result from good educational institutions: I saw this book courtesy of my daughter and was able to spend time with it over the holidays. There is an urgent message here, as everyone knows and WWF is able to get important people on board, not only with endorsements but with their explanations of the threat the world's ecology is facing. This book does a good job of framing out the larger picture already set by books this year which have given compelling narratives also illustrating the biodiversity crisis-- Goodall's Reason for Hope, Johnson and Coates' Nabokov's Blues, and other books like Quammen's Song of the Dodo. Its good to see all these books getting attention. It is going to take a mammoth awareness to really move the world, most of whom will never see amazon.com and this review away from the global destruction that today is most often the norm.

This book is truly incredible!Sometimes,I can`t believe my eyes. The original purpose of this book is to make people care about the ecosystems and why we should not destroy them.But I don`t know if this is a suitable purpose for a book like this one. The splendid photographs makes you forget that and just look at the true beauty of our planet. Over 200 locations and 250 illustrations makes a perfect view of world wildlife. Among my favourites are the mexican deserts,the Pantanal Rainforest and all of the underwater photographs. I am a lover of all kinds of animals,especially fishes. So that`s why the book is perfect for me. I recognize Frans Lanting and David Doubilet since earlier,and I got books by them both. Galen Rowell is new to me,but he seems to be very good too. And when these three photographs together,the results easily become the most beautifull nature photography book ever made!It is pretty expensive,but believe me,it`s worth the money. I highly recommend this to every lover of nature photographs or strong colours. It is truly inspiring.

This magnificent book is designed to be the window dressing for a joint initiative by the World Wildlife Fund and the National Geographic Society to classify the entire planet by ecoregions -"geographically distinct areas that are characterized by distinctive climate, ecological features, and plant and animal communities." For more information on this fascinating and important initiative (and to purchase the colorful ecoregions map upon which "Living Edens" is based) check out the website at www.nationalgeographic.com/wildworld

Alright, back to the book. While there are many hundreds of ecoregions, the WWF has selected 200 that are highly threatened. They then sent Galen Rowell(dec.), Frans Lanting and David Doubilet - three of the finest nature photographers in the world - around the globe to make a photo-documentation of several of the "Global 200" sites. The result is this astounding book.

The purpose of the book is really to show off a selection of ecoregions in a series of stunning photographs. There is not a great deal of accompanying text. The book is meant to be used in conjunction with the WildWorld website and the WildWorld map that I mentioned earlier.

Buy this book, go the WildWorld website, and begin the most in-depth exploration of our living planet I could have ever dreamt possible. It is a decision you will never regret.

This book is truly a gem among books. It contains stunning photography and i love the way that it is mostly pictures. Most books go on and on about the animals, which leaves less room for photographs. This is an astonishing book, and i highly reccomend it!

I'm glad I borrowed this book thru interlibrary loan first rather than buying it outright. The photos are quite nice but not organized in a way that's very informative or give me a good idea about any of the "edens". There's pretty minimal text which might offer the contributor's views on what they photographed and give interesting backstories.

I suppose its a personal preference and if you want an random assortment of pretty good animal pictures, its not bad at all, but I find it unappealing.