100 Best Climate Change Books of All Time (Updated for 2026)

1

The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History

Elizabeth Kolbert

5.0

Over the last half-billion years, there have been five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Scientists around the world are currently monitoring the sixth extinction, predicted to be the most devastating extinction event since the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. This time around, the cataclysm is us.

In prose that is at once fran

Recommended by Barack Obama, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and 6 others.

Barack Obama

Former USA President

The president also released a list of his summer favorites back in 2015: All That Is, James Salter The Sixth Extinction, Elizabeth Kolbert The Lowland, Jhumpa Lahiri Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates Washington: A Life, Ron Chernow All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History, by Elizabeth Kolbert. Climate change is a big problem—one of the biggest we’ll face this century—but it’s not the only environmental concern on the horizon. Humans are putting down massive amounts of pavement, moving species around the planet, over-fishing and acidifying the oceans, changing the chemical composition of rivers, and more. Natural scientists posit that there have been five extinction events in the Earth’s history (think of the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs), and Kolbert makes a compelling case that human activity is leading to the sixth. Unlike a lot of people who write about the environment, Kolbert doesn’t resort to hype. She just lays out the facts and wraps them in memorable anecdotes. It’s a sobering but engaging and informative read. [source]

Jeff Bezos

Founder/Amazon

"In his autobiography, Walmart's founder expounds on the principles of discount retailing and discusses his core values of frugality and a bias for action — a willingness to try a lot of things and make many mistakes. Bezos included both in Amazon's corporate values," Brad Stone writes. [source]

2

This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate

Naomi Klein

4.9

Forget everything you think you know about global warming. It's not about carbon – it's about capitalism. The good news is that we can seize this crisis to transform our failed economic system and build something radically better.

In her most provocative book yet, Naomi Klein, author of the global bestsellers The Shock Doctrine and No Logo, exposes the myths that are clouding climate debate.

You ha

3

The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming

David Wallace-Wells

4.8

It is worse, much worse, than you think. If your anxiety about global warming is dominated by fears of sea-level rise, you are barely scratching the surface of what terrors are possible. In California, wildfires now rage year-round, destroying thousands of homes. Across the US, "500-year" storms pummel communities month after month, and floods displace tens of millions annually.

This is only a prev

Recommended by Elizabeth Kolbert, Gerald Butts, Jonathan Safran Foer, and 1 others.

Elizabeth Kolbert

Author

David Wallace-Wells argues that the impacts of climate change will be much graver than most people realize, and he's right. The Uninhabitable Earth is a timely and provocative work. [source]

Gerald Butts

This is a terrific book. Not as depressing as it may sound, even oddly hopeful in the end. Great read if you suddenly have time on your hands. https://t.co/2Bo5DeT3Aa [source]

Jonathan Safran Foer

Most of us know the gist, if not the details, of the climate change crisis. And yet it is almost impossible to sustain strong feelings about it. David Wallace-Wells has now provided the details, and with writing that is not only clear and forceful, but often imaginative and even funny, he has found a way to make the information deeply felt. [source]

4

Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming

Paul Hawken

4.7

- New York Times bestseller -

The 100 most substantive solutions to reverse global warming, based on meticulous research by leading scientists and policymakers around the world

"At this point in time, the Drawdown book is exactly what is needed; a credible, conservative solution-by-solution narrative that we can do it. Reading it is an effective inoculation against the widespread perception of doom

Recommended by Andreas Kuhlmann, Jessica Rolph, John Elkington, and 1 others.

Andreas Kuhlmann

Drawdown is an exceptional example of cooperation between some of the sharpest thinkers on climate and energy matters, an atlas that has the potential to save the planet. [source]

Jessica Rolph

This book is a beautiful, inspiring, and deeply satisfying read. Most importantly it is no more doom and gloom. It is OPTIMISTIC and empowering. Paul Hawken is a true visionary and a brilliant voice for real solutions. [source]

John Elkington

I am blown away by Drawdown. Like hearing an advance copy of Sergeant Pepper, back in the day. [source]

5

Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming

Erik M Conway

4.6

Preview Summary

The U.S. scientific community has long led the world in research on such areas as public health, environmental science, and issues affecting quality of life. Our scientists have produced landmark studies on the dangers of DDT, tobacco smoke, acid rain, and global warming. But at the same time, a small yet potent subset of this community leads the world in vehement denial of these dangers.

Merchants

Recommended by Elon Musk.

Elon Musk

Founder/SpaceX

I recommend people read a book called Merchants of Doubt. All they need to do is create doubt. [source]

6

Flight Behaviour

Barbara Kingsolver

4.5

Flight Behavior is a brilliant and suspenseful novel set in present day Appalachia; a breathtaking parable of catastrophe and denial that explores how the complexities we inevitably encounter in life lead us to believe in our particular chosen truths.

Kingsolver's riveting story concerns a young wife and mother on a failing farm in rural Tennessee who experiences something she cannot explain, and h

Recommended by Dan Bloom and James Bradley.

Dan Bloom

The novel isn’t about global warming per se. It’s a fable, a poetic fable, with a strong cast of memorable characters. [source]

James Bradley

Flight Behaviour offers a counter-example to the argument social realism is not fit for purpose when it comes to climate change [source]

7

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

Jared Diamond

4.5

In Jared Diamond’s follow-up to the Pulitzer-Prize winning Guns, Germs and Steel, the author explores how climate change, the population explosion and political discord create the conditions for the collapse of civilization

Environmental damage, climate change, globalization, rapid population growth, and unwise political choices were all factors in the demise of societies around the world, but some

Recommended by Bill Gates, Daniel Headrick, David Pilling, and 3 others.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

I found this to be an interesting follow-up to the excellent Guns, Germs, and Steel. It examines the downfall of some of history's greatest civilizations. [source]

Daniel Headrick

I found Jared Diamond’s book Collapse more valuable in influencing my own thinking, because it shows the importance of culture in determining how humans deal with environmental threats. …….The author investigates the successes and failures of a number of civilisations which had reached a crisis point, and looks at why some succeeded and others hadn’t. [source]

David Pilling

This is a warning that societies can do this. We, as a human society, could do this if we’re not careful. If we stretch the earth beyond its planetary limits, we could ruin the soil, we could ruin the ocean, we could ruin the air, and we could drain the ocean of fish. He sees evidence all around that we’re doing precisely that. He sees a limit to technology to solve our problems. [source]

8

The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable

Amitav Ghosh

4.5

Are we deranged? The acclaimed Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh argues that future generations may well think so. How else to explain our imaginative failure in the face of global warming? In his first major book of nonfiction since In an Antique Land, Ghosh examines our inability—at the level of literature, history, and politics—to grasp the scale and violence of climate change.

The extreme nature of

Recommended by Naomi Oreskes.

Naomi Oreskes

Quite a lot, as anyone who reads the book will see. It’s absolutely fascinating on a number of levels. First, we have a famous, articulate and politically astute novelist taking up the issue of climate change. I think that’s extremely important because one of the arguments that Amitav makes in this book, which I agree with one hundred percent, is that for too long this problem has been discussed as scientific question; it’s mostly been covered by science journalists and written up in the science pages of the newspapers. But it’s fundamentally no longer a scientific question. The science — the key scientific issues — have been resolved now for a long time, but it’s a political question because we have to do something about it. It’s an economic question because it has to do with how we run our economies based on fossil fuels, and it’s also a deeply historical question. [source]

9

Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet

Mark Lynas

4.5

Recommended by Aleks Krotoski and Rosamund McDougall.

Aleks Krotoski

Watts has been looking at the small world phenomenon to identify whether the web itself has shrunk our world, and in fact it hasn’t. [source]

Rosamund McDougall

It’s a very fast-moving explicit scenario about what might happen on earth to all of us, with each degree of global warming temperature rise. [source]

10

Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World – and Why Things Are Better Than You Think

Hans Rosling

4.5

Preview Summary

Factfulness: The stress-reducing habit of only carrying opinions for which you have strong supporting facts.

When asked simple questions about global trends—what percentage of the world’s population live in poverty; why the world’s population is increasing; how many girls finish school—we systematically get the answers wrong. So wrong that a chimpanzee choosing answers at random will consistently o

Recommended by Barack Obama, Bill Gates, Aidan Connolly, and 6 others.

Barack Obama

Former USA President

As 2018 draws to a close, I’m continuing a favorite tradition of mine and sharing my year-end lists. It gives me a moment to pause and reflect on the year through the books I found most thought-provoking, inspiring, or just plain loved. It also gives me a chance to highlight talented authors – some who are household names and others who you may not have heard of before. Here’s my best of 2018 list. [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

This was a breakthrough to me. The framework Hans enunciates is one that took me decades of working in global development to create for myself, and I could have never expressed it in such a clear way. I’m going to try to use this model moving forward. [source]

Aidan Connolly

I would suggest Hans Rosling’s Factfulness on the real world of statistics. [source]

11

No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference

Greta Thunberg

4.5

The history-making, ground-breaking speeches of Greta Thunberg, the young activist who has become the voice of a generation

'Everything needs to change. And it has to start today'

In August 2018 a fifteen-year-old Swedish girl, Greta Thunberg, decided not to go to school one day. Her actions ended up sparking a global movement for action against the climate crisis, inspiring millions of pupils to

12

Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature, and Climate Change

Elizabeth Kolbert

4.4

Elizabeth Kolbert's environmental classic Field Notes from a Catastrophe first developed out of a groundbreaking, National Magazine Award-winning three-part series in The New Yorker. She expanded it into a still-concise yet richly researched and damning book about climate change: a primer on the greatest challenge facing the world today.

But in the years since, the story has continued to develop; t

Recommended by Gaia Vince and Kate Marvel.

Gaia Vince

Field Notes was refreshing, a trailblazer. Kolbert actually went to communities affected, on the frontline of climate change. [source]

Kate Marvel

Kolbert gives glimpses into what climate change actually means. She shows the interconnectedness of climate and ecosystems and society. [source]

13

The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World

Jeff Goodell

4.4

What if Atlantis wasn't a myth, but an early precursor to a new age of great flooding? Across the globe, scientists and civilians alike are noticing rapidly rising sea levels, and higher and higher tides pushing more water directly into the places we live, from our most vibrant, historic cities to our last remaining traditional coastal villages. With each crack in the great ice sheets of the Arcti

Recommended by John Green and Elizabeth Kolbert.

John Green

Author

This harrowing, compulsively readable, and carefully researched book lays out in clear-eyed detail what Earth's changing climate means for us today, and what it will mean for future generations... It's a thriller in which the hero in peril is us [source]

Elizabeth Kolbert

Author

Jeff Goodell has taken on some of the most important issues of our time, from coal mining to geoengineering. In The Water Will Come, he explains the threat of sea level rise with characteristic rigor and intelligence. The result is at once deeply persuasive and deeply unsettling. [source]

14

On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal

Naomi Klein

4.4

#1 international and New York Times bestselling author Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine and This Changes Everything, makes the case for a Green New Deal—explaining how bold climate action can be a blueprint for a just and thriving society.

For more than twenty years, Naomi Klein has been the foremost chronicler of the economic war waged on both people and planet—and an unapologetic champio

Recommended by Daniel Bryan.

Daniel Bryan

Love @NaomiAKlein’s new book, On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal. It makes powerful, compelling arguments for how we can not only combat climate change, but create a more just society in the process. Quotes and ideas in the thread #GreenNewDeal [source]

15

The Overstory

Richard Powers

4.3

The Overstory is a sweeping, impassioned work of activism and resistance that is also a stunning evocation of - and paean to - the natural world. From the roots to the crown and back to the seeds, Richard Powers’s twelfth novel unfolds in concentric rings of interlocking fables that range from antebellum New York to the late twentieth-century Timber Wars of the Pacific Northwest and beyond. There

Recommended by Kwame Anthony Appiah, Martha Kearney, and Sarah Dry.

Kwame Anthony Appiah

Feels at the beginning like a series of short stories, each of which has some important thing about a tree or a kind of tree in it, but also holds some human character. You’d be a very strange person if you came away from this book not caring about what’s happening to the trees. [source]

Martha Kearney

@omrgriffiths @BBCPM @RobGMacfarlane Great idea. Loved that book. [source]

Sarah Dry

I had the experience of having the revelation that the author clearly hoped a reader would have, which is that what appears to be a book about distinct individuals—almost a book of short stories— turns out to be something more complex, in which all the characters are linked through time and space. [source]

16

Don't Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change

George Marshall

4.3

A witty, insightful, and groundbreaking take on one of the most urgent questions of our time: Why, despite overwhelming scientific evidence, do we still ignore climate change?

Most of us recognize that climate change is real yet we do nothing to stop it. What is the psychological mechanism that allows us to know something is true but act as if it is not? George Marshall’s search for the answers bri

17

Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity

James Hansen

4.3

In Storms of My Grandchildren, Dr. James Hansen—the nation’s leading scientist on climate issues—speaks out for the first time with the full truth about global warming: The planet is hurtling even more rapidly than previously acknowledged to a climatic point of no return.

Although the threat of human-caused climate change is now widely recognized, politicians have failed to connect policy with the

Recommended by Al Gore, Caspar Henderson, Mary Robinson, and 1 others.

Al Gore

Founder/Alliance for Climate Protection

When the history of the climate crisis is written, Hansen will be seen as the scientist with the most powerful and consistent voice calling for intelligent action to preserve our planet's environment. [source]

Caspar Henderson

James Hanson and I share a very real and personal concern: what future awaits our grandchildren if the world does not take appropriate action – now? [source]

Mary Robinson

I’ve chosen Storms of my Grandchildren by the leading climate scientist James Hanson. Some 20 years ago, testifying in front of the US Congress, Hanson brought global warming to the world’s attention. What is of particular interest to me now is that he and I share a very real and personal concern; what future awaits our grandchildren if the world does not take appropriate action – NOW. [source]

18

The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go from Here

Hope Jahren

4.3

From the bestselling author of Lab Girl comes a slim, urgent missive on the defining issue of our time: here is Hope Jahren on climate change, our timeless pursuit of more, and how the same human ambition that got us here can also be our salvation. A Vintage Original.

Hope Jahren is an award-winning geobiologist, a brilliant writer, and one of the seven billion people with whom we share this earth.

19

We Are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast

Jonathan Safran Foer

4.3

Some people reject the fact, overwhelmingly supported by scientists, that our planet is warming because of human activity. But do those of us who accept the reality of human-caused climate change truly believe it? If we did, surely we would be roused to act on what we know. Will future generations distinguish between those who didn’t believe in the science of global warming and those who said they

Recommended by Matt Haig and Matt Haig.

Matt Haig

A brilliant book. Advocates a world war scale emergency response to climate change. And reminds us how much human behaviour can change for the better when the chips are down and we understand and FEEL like the stakes are high. https://t.co/GekPX3xwN0 [source]

Matt Haig

A brilliant book. Advocates a world war scale emergency response to climate change. And reminds us how much human behaviour can change for the better when the chips are down and we understand and FEEL like the stakes are high. https://t.co/GekPX3xwN0 [source]

20

The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth

Tim Flannery

4.3

An international best seller embraced and endorsed by policy makers, scientists, writers and energy industry executives from around the world, Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers contributed in bringing the topic of global warming to national prominence. For the first time, a scientist provided an accessible and comprehensive account of the history, current status, and future impact of climate chang

Recommended by Richard Branson.

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

21

Losing Earth: A Recent History

Nathaniel Rich

4.3

By 1979, we knew nearly everything we understand today about climate change--including how to stop it. Over the next decade, a handful of scientists, politicians, and strategists, led by two unlikely heroes, risked their careers in a desperate, escalating campaign to convince the world to act before it was too late. Losing Earth is their story, and ours.

The New York Times Magazine devoted an entir

22

Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?

Bill McKibben

4.3

Thirty years ago Bill McKibben offered one of the earliest warnings about climate change. Now he broadens the warning: the entire human game, he suggests, has begun to play itself out.

Bill McKibben’s groundbreaking book The End of Nature -- issued in dozens of languages and long regarded as a classic -- was the first book to alert us to global warming. But the danger is broader than that: even as

Recommended by Al Gore and Ellen Page.

Al Gore

Founder/Alliance for Climate Protection

.@BillMcKibben’s new book “Falter” is a must-read for those grappling with hope and despair on the climate crisis. He paints a vivid portrait of the complex issues facing us as a species - and how we can move forward. I’m thankful to Bill for his leadership. [source]

Ellen Page

You need to read @billmckibben’s new book, Falter. Truly. A must. Thank you @billmckibben for your endlessly inspiring and vital work. https://t.co/nTOyU14F4j [source]

23

Silent Spring

Rachel Carson

4.3

Preview Summary

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was first published in three serialized excerpts in the New Yorker in June of 1962. The book appeared in September of that year and the outcry that followed its publication forced the banning of DDT and spurred revolutionary changes in the laws affecting our air, land, and water. Carson’s passionate concern for the future of our planet reverberated powerfully througho

Recommended by John Kerry.

John Kerry

I’d start with Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, which looked at how pesticide use was harming, and in some cases killing, animals and humans, and really was the first book of its kind to illustrate this environmental destruction. I’ve been so involved in the environment for years and years and that has been a great guideline – it was really the awakening, if you will, to the environmental movement and to the progress we’ve made over the last quarter century or more. [source]

24

Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet

Bill McKibben

4.3

Our old familiar globe is suddenly melting, drying, acidifying, flooding, and burning in ways that no human has ever seen. We've created, in very short order, a new planet, still recognizable but fundamentally different. We may as well call it Eaarth.

That new planet is filled with new binds and traps. A changing world costs large sums to defend--think of the money that went to repair New Orleans,

25

This Is Not A Drill: An Extinction Rebellion Handbook

Extinction Rebellion

4.3

Extinction Rebellion are inspiring a whole generation to take action on climate breakdown.

Now you can become part of the movement - and together, we can make history.

It's time. This is our last chance to do anything about the global climate and ecological emergency. Our last chance to save the world as we know it.

Now or never, we need to be radical. We need to rise up. And we need to rebel.

Extinc

Recommended by Adam Wagner.

Adam Wagner

Very excited to see the @ExtinctionR book in the wild! Some great essays and guides to protest. And turn to the back... https://t.co/RygUt78GvN [source]

26

The Death and Life of the Great Lakes

Dan Egan

4.3

A master reporter’s landmark work of contemporary ecology.

The Great Lakes hold 20 percent of the world’s freshwater, and they provide food, work, and weekend fun for tens of millions of Americans. Yet they are under threat as never before.

In a work of narrative reporting in the vein of Rachel Carson and Elizabeth Kolbert, prize-winning reporter Dan Egan delivers an eye-opening portrait of our nati

27

Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution – and How It Can Renew America

Thomas L. Friedman

4.3

In this brilliant, essential book, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Thomas L. Friedman speaks to America's urgent need for national renewal and explains how a green revolution can bring about both a sustainable environment and a sustainable America.

Friedman explains how global warming, rapidly growing populations, and the expansion of the world’s middle class through globalization have produced a da

Recommended by Barack Obama, Bill Gates, and Jonathon Porritt.

Barack Obama

Former USA President

He may have the country’s finest experts at his fingertips, but it still doesn’t hurt to read up on environmental and economic issues. [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

On Bill Gates's reading list in 2011. [source]

Jonathon Porritt

Thomas Friedman is an American commentator and a bit of a business guru. This book is lively, beautifully written, full of personal anecdotes. I should say that Friedman used to piss me off more than most other writers because he never talked about resources, climate change, population growth – these were invisible issues for him. Then, a few years ago, something changed and he started to address all this. [source]

28

The Future We Choose: Surviving the Climate Crisis

Christiana Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac

4.2

In this cautionary but optimistic book, Figueres and Rivett-Carnac--the architects of the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement--tackle arguably the most urgent and consequential challenge humankind has ever faced: the world's changing climate and the fate of humanity.

In The Future We Choose, the authors outline two possible scenarios for the planet. In one, they describe what life on Earth will be

Recommended by Fred Krupp.

Fred Krupp

I love this message of hope and empowerment from @CFigueres former UNFCCC executive secretary. This book is exactly what we need. Get your copy today: https://t.co/XwRo3oQw0i https://t.co/VKpoJsZbiE [source]

29

Sustainable Energy - Without the Hot Air

David MacKay

4.2

Addressing the sustainable energy crisis in an objective manner, this enlightening book analyzes the relevant numbers and organizes a plan for change on both a personal level and an international scale—for Europe, the Untied States, and the world. In case study format, this informative reference answers questions surrounding nuclear energy, the potential of sustainable fossil fuels, and the possib

Recommended by Bill Gates, Chris Goodall, John Shepherd, and 2 others.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

If someone wants an overall view of how energy gets used, where it comes from, and the challenges in switching to new sources, this is the book to read. [source]

Chris Goodall

What the late David MacKay did was give us a rigorous understanding of the way that we use and generate energy. [source]

John Shepherd

MacKay does very simple, back-of-the-envelope sums, as to how much energy could we get from bio-fuels, how much energy could we get from wind power, how much land would it take? [source]

30

An Inconvenient Truth: The Planetary Emergency of Global Warming and What We Can Do About It

Al Gore

4.2

Book by Al Gore

Recommended by Richard Branson.

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

31

Oryx and Crake (MaddAddam, #1)

Margaret Atwood

4.2

Oryx and Crake is at once an unforgettable love story and a compelling vision of the future. Snowman, known as Jimmy before mankind was overwhelmed by a plague, is struggling to survive in a world where he may be the last human, and mourning the loss of his best friend, Crake, and the beautiful and elusive Oryx whom they both loved. In search of answers, Snowman embarks on a journey–with the help

Recommended by Matthew Taylor and Tim @Realscientists.

Matthew Taylor

Oryx and Crake is here because it’s about the logical conclusion of a whole set of processes that we could have called progress. In my lecture I talked about the logic of progress: the logic of science and technology, the logic of markets, the logic of bureaucracy. And if you want a wonderful dystopian vision of what happens if you take these forward without any recourse to ethical considerations – without asking what progress represents – then Oryx and Crake does that. This novel was recommended by Karen Buck MP and it has influenced me as a wonderful account of a world run by large biotech corporations, where society is deeply dysfunctional and on the verge of self-destruction because nobody has stopped to say, ‘Is this the right thing to do? Is this the human thing to do? What does it mean to be human and are we still human beings?’ The book is a scream of, ‘When do we ask the big questions about any of this?’ [source]

Tim @Realscientists

The theme of hopelessness was the most profound I thought, as the narrative rattles through the devastatingly self-conscious decay of the main character's mind, the echoes of his life writhing and senescing inside his withering brain. Please read this great book :) https://t.co/1XVpw92bbb [source]

32

The Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change Denial Is Threatening Our Planet, Destroying Our Politics, and Driving Us Crazy

Michael Mann, Tom Toles

4.2

The award-winning climate scientist Michael E. Mann and the Pulitzer Prize-winning political cartoonist Tom Toles have been on the front lines of the fight against climate denialism for most of their careers. They have witnessed the manipulation of the media by business and political interests and the unconscionable play to partisanship on issues that affect the well-being of billions. The lessons

Recommended by Mario Picazo and Naomi Oreskes.

Mario Picazo

@MichaelEMann @TomTolesToons Thanks! love the book! [source]

Naomi Oreskes

I chose this book for a couple of reasons. As you said, the politics of climate change is a difficult and dark subject and none of the books I have chosen so far is exactly an upbeat read. So, it is helpful in all this to find a way to keep a sense of humour. It’s not always easy but Tom Toles does that. And, of course, satire can be one of the most effective means of communication. So, I thought it would be good to add something that – even though it’s a very serious book in some ways – is also not as hard and difficult as the other books. It also connects back to Amitav Ghosh’s point: that this whole situation is pretty much insane. One of the brilliant things about Tom Toles’ cartoons is that he shines a light on that and he makes people realise how really crazy some of the things that climate change deniers say are and how crazy some of the things they do are. I could go on for hours lecturing about some of these things but with Tom Toles’ cartoons you get it in an instant. [source]

33

Parable of the Sower

Octavia E. Butler, Gloria Steinem

4.2

Parable of the Sower is the Butlerian odyssey of one woman who is twice as feeling in a world that has become doubly dehumanized. The time is 2025. The place is California, where small walled communities must protect themselves from hordes of desperate scavengers and roaming bands of people addicted to a drug that activates an orgasmic desire to burn, rape, and murder. When one small community is

Recommended by Brian Boyer.

Brian Boyer

One book that’ll be in my bag: Parable if the Sower. It’s a brilliant, prescient read and, like all of Butler’s work, has much to teach us about justice. But it’s also informed my thinking about teamwork, and (surprise!) project management. https://t.co/NrPd9uiV2c [source]

34

The World Without Us

Alan Weisman

4.2

Preview Summary

A penetrating, page-turning tour of a post-human Earth

In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman offers an utterly original approach to questions of humanity's impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us. In this far-reaching narrative, Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immorta

Recommended by Richard Branson.

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

35

The Ends of the World: Volcanic Apocalypses, Lethal Oceans, and Our Quest to Understand Earth's Past Mass Extinctions

Peter Brannen

4.2

As new groundbreaking research suggests that climate change played a major role in the most extreme catastrophes in the planet's history, award-winning science journalist Peter Brannen takes us on a wild ride through the planet's five mass extinctions and, in the process, offers us a glimpse of our increasingly dangerous future

Our world has ended five times: it has been broiled, frozen, poison-ga

36

Rising: Dispatches from the New American Shore

Elizabeth Rush

4.2

WINNER OF THE NATIONAL OUTDOOR BOOK AWARD
A CHICAGO TRIBUNE TOP TEN BOOK OF 2018
A GUARDIAN, NPR's SCIENCE FRIDAY, PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, AND LIBRARY JOURNAL BEST BOOK OF 2018

Hailed as "deeply felt" (New York Times), "a revelation" (Pacific Standard), and "the book on climate change and sea levels that was missing" (Chicago Tribune), Rising is both a highly original work of lyric reportage and a haunt

37

Climate Change: What Everyone Needs to Know®

Joseph Romm

4.2

The essential primer on what will be the defining issue of our time, Climate Change: What Everyone Needs to Know(R) is a clear-eyed overview of the science, conflicts, and implications of our warming planet.

From Joseph Romm, Chief Science Advisor for National Geographic's Years of Living Dangerously series and one of Rolling Stone's "100 people who are changing America," Climate Change offers user

38

The End of Ice

Dahr Jamail

4.2

After nearly a decade overseas as a war reporter, the acclaimed journalist Dahr Jamail returned to America to renew his passion for mountaineering, only to find that the slopes he had once climbed have been irrevocably changed by climate disruption.

In response, Jamail embarks on a journey to the geographical front lines of this crisis—from Alaska to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, via the Amazon

39

With Speed and Violence: Why Scientists Fear Tipping Points in Climate Change

Fred Pearce

4.2

Fred Pearce has been writing about climate change for eighteen years, and the more he learns, the worse things look. Where once scientists were concerned about gradual climate change, now more and more of them fear we will soon be dealing with abrupt change resulting from triggering hidden tipping points. Even President Bush's top climate modeler, Jim Hansen, warned in 2005 that "we are on the pre

40

The Water Knife

Paolo Bacigalupi

4.2

In the American Southwest, Nevada, Arizona, and California skirmish for dwindling shares of the Colorado River. Into the fray steps Angel Velasquez, leg-breaker, assassin, and spy. A Las Vegas water knife, Angel "cuts" water for his boss, Catherine Case, ensuring that her luxurious developments can bloom in the desert, so the rich can stay wet while the poor get dust. When rumors of a game-changin

41

The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism

Naomi Klein

4.2

Preview Summary

In her ground-breaking reporting from Iraq, Naomi Klein exposed how the trauma of invasion was being exploited to remake the country in the interest of foreign corporations. She called it "disaster capitalism." Covering Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, and New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this tim

Recommended by Donna Dickenson, George Monbiot, and Mat Whitecross.

Donna Dickenson

Naomi Klein’s argument is that capitalism actually requires deliberately engineered shocks to the economic systems. [source]

George Monbiot

The Shock Doctrine explains some of the mechanisms by which patrimonial capital acquires power and enhances its wealth. It’s a brilliant piece of work, and one of those rare books that changes the way you perceive the world. [source]

Mat Whitecross

It starts with the theory that moments of crisis have been utilised by the right wing in the US and other countries to manipulate people into following their agenda. [source]

42

The End Of Nature

Bill McKibben

4.2

Looks at what we are doing to damage nature and what this will mean for our collective futures. This book argues that our view of nature, its role in our lives and consciousness, has irretrievably altered. It states that if the world is to survive, we have to rethink this relationship. It shows how much has changed - both for better and for worse.

Recommended by Gaia Vince.

Gaia Vince

The End of Nature is the fundamental book about the global planetary change that we’re undergoing. [source]

43

Heat: How to Stop the Planet From Burning

George Monbiot

4.2

Heat: How to Stop the Planet From Burning marks an important moment in our civilization’s thinking about global warming. The question is no longer Is climate change actually happening? but What do we do about it? George Monbiot offers an ambitious and far-reaching program to cut our carbon dioxide emissions to the point where the environmental scales start tipping back—away from catastrophe.

Thoug

44

Windfall: The Booming Business of Global Warming

Mckenzie Funk

4.2

A fascinating investigation into how people around the globe are cashing in on a warming world

McKenzie Funk has spent the last six years reporting around the world on how we are preparing for a warmer planet. Funk shows us that the best way to understand the catastrophe of global warming is to see it through the eyes of those who see it most clearly—as a market opportunity.

Global warming’s physica

45

Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist

Kate Raworth

4.2

Preview Summary

Economics is the mother tongue of public policy. It dominates our decision-making for the future, guides multi-billion-dollar investments, and shapes our responses to climate change, inequality, and other environmental and social challenges that define our times.

Pity then, or more like disaster, that its fundamental ideas are centuries out of date yet are still taught in college courses worldwide

Recommended by Tim O'Reilly, Fernando Lelo Larrea, George Monbiot, and 1 others.

Tim O'Reilly

Founder/O'Reilly Media

I am loving @KateRaworth’s book Doughnut Economics. It puts #inequality in a far broader context, connecting a great many 21st century problems with a single vision. Every business leader and every policy maker should read it. For a quick summary, see https://t.co/harwQvlLlC [source]

Fernando Lelo Larrea

🍩Amazing book by @KateRaworth #DoughnutEconomics . I really wish all my Economics students can read it. Fundamental rethinking of our science and what lays ahead. https://t.co/oWUL1TwSYh [source]

George Monbiot

Doughnut Economics tries to reconcile an environmental vision with the vision of widely shared prosperity. [source]

46

The Fifth Season (The Broken Earth, #1)

N. K. Jemisin

4.2

Three terrible things happen in a single day. Essun, masquerading as an ordinary schoolteacher in a quiet small town, comes home to find that her husband has brutally murdered their son and kidnapped their daughter. Mighty Sanze, the empire whose innovations have been civilization's bedrock for a thousand years, collapses as its greatest city is destroyed by a madman's vengeance. And worst of all,

Recommended by Jacquelyn Gill and John Lilly.

Jacquelyn Gill

@MaraWilson It’s such an amazing book. One of my all-time favorites—and the entire trilogy is that strong! [source]

John Lilly

@fredmcclimans First author to win 3 Hugos in a row. So: not bad! First book strongest imho, but all of it great. [source]

47

The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate – Discoveries from a Secret World

Peter Wohlleben

4.2

Preview Summary

In The Hidden Life of Trees, Peter Wohlleben shares his deep love of woods and forests and explains the amazing processes of life, death, and regeneration he has observed in the woodland and the amazing scientific processes behind the wonders of which we are blissfully unaware. Much like human families, tree parents live together with their children, communicate with them, and support them as they

Recommended by Emma Watson.

48

The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines

Michael Mann

4.2

The ongoing assault on climate science in the United States has never been more aggressive, more blatant, or more widely publicized than in the case of the Hockey Stick graph--a clear and compelling visual presentation of scientific data, put together by MichaelE. Mann and his colleagues, demonstrating that global temperatures have risen in conjunction with the increase in industrialization and th

Recommended by Bill McKibben, Bill Nye, and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Bill McKibben

Very few people have sounded more important alarms about our climate future, and very few people have paid a higher price for doing so. Michael Mann is a hero, and this book is a remarkable account of the science and politics of the defining issue of our time. [source]

Bill Nye

Changed the way most of us understood the natural history of Earth. Ours is only the second species known to be capable of changing the climate of an entire planet. [source]

Leonardo DiCaprio

Check out Michael Mann's book "The Hockey Stick & the Climate Wars" about his battle against climate denialism. [source]

49

Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things

William McDonough

4.2

"Reduce, reuse, recycle," urge environmentalists; in other words, do more with less in order to minimize damage. But as architect William McDonough and chemist Michael Braungart point out in this provocative, visionary book, such an approach only perpetuates the one-way, "cradle to grave" manufacturing model, dating to the Industrial Revolution, that creates such fantastic amounts of waste and pol

Recommended by Joe Gebbia, Jerry McNerney, and Kate Raworth.

Joe Gebbia

Co-founder/Airbnb

Was hugely influential. [source]

Kate Raworth

Helped me to reimagine how industry could be designed to work with, rather than against, the cycles of the living world. [source]

50

Unstoppable: Harnessing Science to Change the World

Bill Nye, Corey S. Powell

4.2

Just as World War II called an earlier generation to greatness, so the climate crisis is calling today's rising youth to action: to create a better future.

In Unstoppable, Bill Nye crystallizes and expands the message for which he is best known and beloved. That message is that with a combination of optimism and scientific curiosity, all obstacles become opportunities, and the possibilities of our

51

Learning to Die in the Anthropocene: Reflections on the End of a Civilization

Roy Scranton

4.1

"Roy Scranton lucidly articulates the depth of the climate crisis with an honesty that is all too rare, then calls for a reimagined humanism that will help us meet our stormy future with as much decency as we can muster. While I don't share his conclusions about the potential for social movements to drive ambitious mitigation, this is a wise and important challenge from an elegant writer and origi

Recommended by Naomi Oreskes.

Naomi Oreskes

It is a very dark book and, by recommending it, I’m not suggesting I necessarily agree with everything in it or even necessarily agree with his ultimately bleak assessment, but I do think it’s an extremely important book. I say that for two reasons. I think he’s fundamentally right about the essential point, which is that we have a tremendously difficult time assimilating just how serious this problem really is. For that reason, I think that there’s a tendency for many people — even people who accept that this problem is real — to say that ‘well, we’re going to fix this, we’re going to get out of this mess.’ [source]

52

The Limits To Growth: the thirty year update

Donella H. Meadows

4.1

Incorporating the thinking on sustainability, ecological footprinting and limits, this book presents future overshoot scenarios and makes an urgent case for a rapid readjustment of the global economy toward a sustainable path. It is suitable for those concerned with our common future.

Recommended by Bill Gates, Andrew Curry, Jerry McNerney, and 2 others.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

On Bill Gates's reading list in 2012. [source]

Andrew Curry

This is such a depressing book. This is The Limits to Growth: The Thirty Year Update. A lot of people, what they remember about The Limits to Growth is it was published in 1971 and was completely lambasted by economists, technologists, lots and lots of people. What it has sitting underneath it is a model of the world, a model of the world economy, which links population, food, industrial production, pollution, a few other things, it’s quite a complicated systems-dynamics model. Obviously it’s only a model, it’s a picture of the world, it isn’t the world itself. But what it said was that if our behaviour as a society didn’t change, we would end up with industrial collapse in the mid-2020s and a population collapse in the mid-2030s. [source]

Jonathon Porritt

This is a report produced in 1972, but it’s still as current now as it was then and is still available today. It was commissioned by the Club of Rome and produced by Massachusetts Institute of Technology. What they did was simply to look at projections for world population, industrialisation, pollution, food production and resource depletion and draw up models of what would happen to the earth in those areas. [source]

53

Climate Wars: The Fight for Survival as the World Overheats

Gwynne Dyer

4.1

Dwindling resources. Massive population shifts. Natural disasters. Spreading epidemics. Drought. Rising sea levels. Plummeting agricultural yields. Crashing economies. Political extremism. These are some of the expected consequences of runaway climate change in the decades ahead, and any of them could tip the world towards conflict. Prescient, unflinching, and based on exhaustive research, Climate

Recommended by Dennis Bushnell and Amory B. Lovins.

Dennis Bushnell

Chief Scientist/NASA Langley

Gwynne Dyer is one of the few who are both courageous enough to tell the unvarnished truth, and have the background to understand, not misrepresent the inputs. This book does a superb job of detailing the merging realities of climate/energy. These realities are not pretty. [source]

Amory B. Lovins

Anyone still complacent about climate change will find Climate Wars instructive and disturbing. These articulate insights into climate geopolitics by Gwynne Dyer are an important tool for understanding why the climate challenge is big, hard, and vital to human survival — yet soluble if we pay attention now. [source]

54

Climate: A New Story

Charles Eisenstein

4.1

Flipping the script on climate change, Eisenstein makes a case for a wholesale reimagining of the framing, tactics, and goals we employ in our journey to heal from ecological destruction

With research and insight, Charles Eisenstein details how the quantification of the natural world leads to a lack of integration and our “fight” mentality. With an entire chapter unpacking the climate change denie

55

New York 2140

Kim Stanley Robinson

4.1

It is 2140.

The waters rose, submerging New York City.

But the residents adapted and it remained the bustling, vibrant metropolis it had always been. Though changed forever.

Every street became a canal. Every skyscraper an island.

Through the eyes of the varied inhabitants of one building, Kim Stanley Robinson shows us how one of our great cities will change with the rising tides.

And how we too will

56

Eating Animals

Jonathan Safran Foer

4.1

Jonathan Safran Foer spent much of his life oscillating between enthusiastic carnivore and occasional vegetarian. Once he started a family, the moral dimensions of food became increasingly important.
Faced with the prospect of being unable to explain why we eat some animals and not others, Foer set out to explore the origins of many eating traditions and the fictions involved with creating them. Tr

Recommended by Louise Gray.

Louise Gray

It’s a really powerful book and I know many people who it has made vegetarian. [source]

57

A Farewell to Ice: A Report from the Arctic

Peter Wadhams

4.1

Peter Wadhams has been studying ice first-hand since 1970, completing 50 trips to the world's poles and observing for himself the changes over the course of nearly five decades. His conclusions are stark: the ice caps are melting. Following the hottest summer on record, sea ice in September 2016 was the thinnest in recorded history. There is now the probability that within a few years, the North P

58

Weather

Jenny Offill

4.1

From the author of the nationwide best seller Dept. of Speculation--one of the New York Times Book Review's Ten Best Books of the Year--a shimmering tour de force about a family, and a nation, in crisis

Lizzie Benson slid into her job as a librarian without a traditional degree. But this gives her a vantage point from which to practice her other calling: she is a fake shrink. For years she has tend

Recommended by Alfred A. Knopf and Cal Flyn.

Alfred A. Knopf

You heard it here first: “the only book you need this February is WEATHER. It might be short, but it invites rereading, filled as it is with jokes, wry asides, brilliant observations, and, you know, pertinent information for surviving the years to come.” https://t.co/ajgR3Hxh8W [source]

Cal Flyn

Just out, and another one not to miss, is Jenny Offill’s Weather, her third novel and the follow-up to her wry, intelligent and heart-rending examination of marital infidelity, art and motherhood Dept. of Speculation, which cannot be recommended highly enough. As with Dept. of Speculation, Weather is built from fragments, some koan-esque and oblique, some directly reported, which Offill reportedly composes, pins to notice boards around her house, and sifts through for many months before settling upon the final formation. [source]

59

Inconvenient Facts: The Science That Al Gore Doesn't Want You to Know

Gregory Wrightstone

4.1

You have been inundated with reports from media, governments, think tanks and “experts” saying that our climate is changing for the worse and it is our fault. Increases in droughts, heat waves, tornadoes and poison ivy—to name a few—are all blamed on our “sins of emissions” from burning fossil fuels and increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Yet, you don’t quite buy into this human-caused cl

60

The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight: The Fate of the World and What We Can Do Before It's Too Late

Thom Hartmann, Neale Donald Walsch

4.1

While everything appears to be collapsing around us -- ecodamage, genetic engineering, virulent diseases, the end of cheap oil, water shortages, global famine, wars -- we can still do something about it and create a world that will work for us and for our children’s children. The inspiration for Leonardo DiCaprio’s web movie Global Warning, The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight details what is happen

Recommended by Leonardo DiCaprio.

Leonardo DiCaprio

Thom Hartmann seeks out interesting subjects from such disparate outposts of curiosity that you have to wonder whether or not he uncovered them or they selected him. [source]

61

Tropic of Chaos: Climate Change and the New Geography of Violence

Christian Parenti

4.1

From Africa to Asia and Latin America, the era of climate wars has begun. Extreme weather is breeding banditry, humanitarian crisis, and state failure. In Tropic of Chaos, investigative journalist Christian Parenti travels along the front lines of this gathering catastrophe--the belt of economically and politically battered postcolonial nations and war zones girding the planet's midlatitudes. Here

62

The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels

Alex Epstein

4.1

A sure-to-be-controversial defense of the fossil fuel industry

Conventional wisdom says fossil fuels are an unsustainable form of energy that is destroying our planet. But Alex Epstein shows that if we look at the big picture, the much-hated fossil fuel industry is dramatically improving our planet by making it a far safer and richer place.
The key difference between a healthy and unhealthy envi

63

Solar

Ian McEwan

4.1

Michael Beard is a Nobel prize–winning physicist whose best work is behind him, and whose fifth marriage is crumbling. However, an invitation to travel to New Mexico offers him a chance for him to extricate himself from his marital problems, reinvigorate his career, and save the world from environmental disaster. Can a man who has made a mess of his life clean up the messes of humanity?

Michael Bea

Recommended by Juliet Davenport.

Juliet Davenport

I met Ian McEwan as part of the Cape Farewell programme. That is an organisation set up by a lovely man called David Buckland, who is a photographer and an artist. He wanted to create a social response to climate change. In other words, he wanted to get people like Ian McEwan to mix with the scientists and find out more about what is going on. So he took a lot of people – including Ian McEwan, Philip Pullman and Jarvis Cocker – to the North Pole along with some scientists, so they could see what was going on for themselves. Ian took what he saw and put it in a novel. He wanted to put some big scientific ideas into everyday language. [source]

64

Dry

Neal Shusterman, Jarrod Shusterman

4.1

When the California drought escalates to catastrophic proportions, one teen is forced to make life and death decisions for her family in this harrowing story of survival,

The drought—or the Tap-Out, as everyone calls it—has been going on for a while now. Everyone’s lives have become an endless list of don’ts: don’t water the lawn, don’t fill up your pool, don’t take long showers.

Until the taps run

65

Oil and Honey: The Education of an Unlikely Activist

Bill McKibben

4.1

Bestselling author and environmental activist Bill McKibben recounts the personal and global story of the fight to build and preserve a sustainable planet

Bill McKibben is not a person you'd expect to find handcuffed and behind bars, but that's where he found himself in the summer of 2011 after leading the largest civil disobedience in thirty years, protesting the Keystone XL pipeline in front of t

Recommended by Julian Bond.

Julian Bond

Whatever color you are, the green movement is your movement. I was proud to go to jail with Bill McKibben as a fellow protester against the Keystone XL pipeline. All you have to do is read this book. [source]

66

No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump’s Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need

Naomi Klein

4.1

New York Times Bestseller
National Book Award Longlist
Publishers Weekly Best Books of 2017

“This is one attempt to uncover how we got to this surreal political moment. It is also an attempt to predict how, under cover of shocks and crises, it could get a lot worse. And it’s a plan for how, if we keep our heads, we might just be able to flip the script and arrive at a radically better future.”
–From t

67

Climate Changed: A Personal Journey through the Science

Philippe Squarzoni

4.1

What are the causes and consequences of climate change? When the scale is so big, can an individual make any difference? Documentary, diary, and masterwork graphic novel, this up-to-date look at our planet and how we live on it explains what global warming is all about. With the most complicated concepts made clear in a feat of investigative journalism by artist Philippe Squarzoni, Climate Changed

68

The Wall

John Lanchester

4.1

Ravaged by the Change, an island nation in a time very like our own has built the Wall―an enormous concrete barrier around its entire coastline. Joseph Kavanagh, a new Defender, has one task: to protect his section of the Wall from the Others, the desperate souls who are trapped amid the rising seas outside and are a constant threat. Failure will result in death or a fate perhaps worse: being put

69

The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt's New World

Andrea Wulf

4.1

The acclaimed author of Founding Gardeners reveals the forgotten life of Alexander von Humboldt, the visionary German naturalist whose ideas changed the way we see the natural world—and in the process created modern environmentalism.

Alexander von Humboldt (1769 – 1859) was an intrepid explorer and the most famous scientist of his age. In North America, his name still graces four counties, thirtee

70

The Windup Girl

Paolo Bacigalupi

4.0

Anderson Lake is a company man, AgriGen's Calorie Man in Thailand. Under cover as a factory manager, Anderson combs Bangkok's street markets in search of foodstuffs thought to be extinct, hoping to reap the bounty of history's lost calories. There, he encounters Emiko...

Emiko is the Windup Girl, a strange and beautiful creature. One of the New People, Emiko is not human; instead, she is an engine

Recommended by Marvin Liao and Seth Godin.

Marvin Liao

Partner/500 Startups

My list would be (besides the ones I mentioned in answer to the previous question) both business & Fiction/Sci-Fi and ones I personally found helpful to myself. The business books explain just exactly how business, work & investing are in reality & how to think properly & differentiate yourself. On the non-business side, a mix of History & classic fiction to understand people, philosophy to make sense of life and Science fiction to picture what the future could be like (not always utopian). [source]

Seth Godin

Author, Marketer, Entrepreneur

Novels: The Windup Girl and Pattern Recognition are chock full of images and ideas that will stick with you for months. [source]

71

The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from the Future

Naomi Oreskes, Erik Conway

4.0

The year is 2393, and a senior scholar of the Second People's Republic of China presents a gripping and deeply disturbing account of how the children of the Enlightenment, the political and economic elites of the so-called advanced industrial societies, entered into a Penumbral period in the early decades of the twenty-first century, a time when sound science and rational discourse about global ch

72

The Revenge of Gaia

James Lovelock, J. E. Lovelock, Crispin Tickell

4.0

73

Underland

Robert Macfarlane

4.0

From the best-selling, award-winning author of Landmarks and The Old Ways, a haunting voyage into the planet’s past and future.

Hailed as "the great nature writer of this generation" (Wall Street Journal), Robert Macfarlane is the celebrated author of books about the intersections of the human and the natural realms. In Underland, he delivers his masterpiece: an epic exploration of the Earth’s unde

Recommended by Alastair Humphreys, Cal Flyn, and Jonathan Green.

Alastair Humphreys

The cleverest and nicest man in the world of travel writing has just published a brilliant new book which you should definitely buy. And so has @robgmacfarlane... 😂 https://t.co/7tWMRoB08W https://t.co/2UmUfDUqpt [source]

Cal Flyn

Having climbed the highest heights in his debut Mountains of the Mind, Macfarlane now dives down to the lowest of the lows. He goes caving in limestone caverns deep underground, rattles through salt mines under the sea in carts and stumbles across (literal) underground subcultures in the Paris catacombs, all interwoven with learned digressions into geological epochs and classical conceptions of the underworld. What can I say? Macfarlane is the most remarkable writer. [source]

Jonathan Green

@mmbrenn yes the best book i read last year without question. beautiful. harrowing. [source]

74

Ship Breaker (Ship Breaker, #1)

Paolo Bacigalupi

4.0

This thrilling bestseller and National Book Award Finalist is a gritty, high-stakes adventure of a teenage boy faced with conflicting loyalties, set in a dark future America devastated by the forces of climate change.

In America's flooded Gulf Coast region, oil is scarce, but loyalty is scarcer. Grounded oil tankers are being broken down for parts by crews of young people. Nailer, a teenage boy, wo

Recommended by Marvin Liao and Adam Minter.

Marvin Liao

Partner/500 Startups

My list would be (besides the ones I mentioned in answer to the previous question) both business & Fiction/Sci-Fi and ones I personally found helpful to myself. The business books explain just exactly how business, work & investing are in reality & how to think properly & differentiate yourself. On the non-business side, a mix of History & classic fiction to understand people, philosophy to make sense of life and Science fiction to picture what the future could be like (not always utopian). [source]

Adam Minter

I like the book not only for being a thriller, but also because of the descriptions of how dangerous this work is, while someone else is getting rich off it. [source]

75

Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet

Michael Bloomberg, Carl Pope

4.0

In 2006, the documentary An Inconvenient Truth set off a heated political debate when it threatened that inaction on climate change would lead to a dark and frightening future by 2016.

Well, that ten year window has closed—and we have neither resolved the threats to our climate, nor gone past the point of no return. To Mayor Bloomberg and Carl Pope, it's clear that to treat climate change as either

76

Hot: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth

Mark Hertsgaard

4.0

A fresh take on climate change by a renowned journalist driven to protect his daughter, your kids, and the next generation who’ll inherit the problem. For twenty years, Mark Hertsgaard has investigated global warming for outlets including theNew Yorker, NPR, Time, Vanity Fair, and The Nation. But the full truth did not hit home until he became a father and, soon thereafter, learned that climate ch

77

The Fate of Food: What We'll Eat in a Bigger, Hotter, Smarter World

Amanda Little

4.0

In the fascinating story of the sustainable food revolution, an environmental journalist and professor asks the question: Is the future of food looking bleak--or better than ever?

"In The Fate of Food, Amanda Little takes us on a tour of the future. The journey is scary, exciting, and, ultimately, encouraging."--Elizabeth Kolbert, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Sixth Extinction

Climate models

78

Climate Justice: Hope, Resilience, and the Fight for a Sustainable Future

Mary Robinson

4.0

An urgent call to arms by one of the most important voices in the international fight against climate change, sharing inspiring stories and offering vital lessons for the path forward.

Holding her first grandchild in her arms in 2003, Mary Robinson was struck by the uncertainty of the world he had been born into. Before his fiftieth birthday, he would share the planet with more than nine billion p

79

World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse

Lester R. Brown

4.0

We are in a race between political and natural tipping points. Can we close coal-fired power plants fast enough to save the Greenland ice sheet and avoid catastrophic sea level rise? Can we raise water productivity fast enough to halt the depletion of aquifers and avoid water-driven food shortages? Can we cope with peak water and peak oil at the same time? These are some of the issues Lester R. Br

Recommended by Bill Gates.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

On Bill Gates's reading list in 2011. [source]

80

The Year of the Flood

Margaret Atwood

4.0

The times and species have been changing at a rapid rate, and the social compact is wearing as thin as environmental stability. Adam One, the kindly leader of the God's Gardeners--a religion devoted to the melding of science and religion, as well as the preservation of all plant and animal life--has long predicted a natural disaster that will alter Earth as we know it. Now it has occurred, obliter

81

Living in Denial: Climate Change, Emotions, and Everyday Life

Kari Marie Norgaard

4.0

Global warming is the most significant environmental issue of our time, yet public response in Western nations has been meager. Why have so few taken any action? In Living in Denial, sociologist Kari Norgaard searches for answers to this question, drawing on interviews and ethnographic data from her study of "Bygdaby," the fictional name of an actual rural community in western Norway, during the u

Recommended by Carol Gilligan and Juliet Schor.

Carol Gilligan

This asks why people with knowledge about climate change often fail to translate that knowledge into action. It describes many kinds of denial. [source]

Juliet Schor

Norway has high formal awareness of climate change. Yet Norgaard was in a skiing village with no snow and the villagers were all in denial about it. [source]

82

The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow's World

Charles C. Mann, Bronson Pinchot

4.0

From the best-selling, award-winning author of 1491 and 1493--an incisive portrait of the two little-known twentieth-century scientists, Norman Borlaug and William Vogt, whose diametrically opposed views shaped our ideas about the environment, laying the groundwork for how people in the twenty-first century will choose to live in tomorrow's world.

In forty years, Earth's population will reach ten b

83

The Age of Sustainable Development

Jeffrey D. Sachs

4.0

Jeffrey D. Sachs is one of the world's most perceptive and original analysts of global development. In this major new work he presents a compelling and practical framework for how global citizens can use a holistic way forward to address the seemingly intractable worldwide problems of persistent extreme poverty, environmental degradation, and political-economic injustice: sustainable development.

S

84

The Climate Casino: Risk, Uncertainty, and Economics for a Warming World

William D. Nordhaus

4.0

Climate change is profoundly altering our world in ways that pose major risks to human societies and natural systems. We have entered the Climate Casino and are rolling the global-warming dice, warns economist William Nordhaus. But there is still time to turn around and walk back out of the casino, and in this essential book the author explains how. Bringing together all the important issues surro

85

Why We Disagree about Climate Change

Mike Hulme

4.0

Climate change is not 'a problem' waiting for 'a solution'. It is an environmental, cultural and political phenomenon which is re-shaping the way we think about ourselves, our societies and humanity's place on Earth. Drawing upon twenty-five years of professional work as an international climate change scientist and public commentator, Mike Hulme provides a unique insider's account of the emergenc

Recommended by David Shukman and Roger Pielke Jr.

David Shukman

The book is not an easy read – at least sections of it aren’t. But it is remarkably clear about what science can do, and what it can’t. So a great phrase of his, which I like, is ‘Science always speaks with a conditional voice.’ There are always uncertainties about science. If you ask a serious climate scientist, ‘What is going to happen?’ their answer will be hedged around with uncertainties. Hulme’s point is that, all too often, the nuances and the uncertainties of science and what’s being said about climate change are lost and all people hear is, ‘We’re going to die tomorrow!’ or that Greenland is going to melt and drown London or New York. [source]

Roger Pielke Jr

Explains not only why we have disagreements about climate change but why it’s important that we have such disagreements. [source]

86

How Bad Are Bananas?: The Carbon Footprint of Everything

Mike Berners-Lee

4.0

A smart, practical, and accessible guide to measuring (and reducing) our carbon footprint, from internationally recognized expert, Mike Berners-Lee.

Part green-lifestyle guide, part popular science, How Bad Are Bananas? is the first book to provide the information we need to make carbon-savvy purchases and informed lifestyle choices and to build carbon considerations into our everyday thinking.

The

Recommended by Duncan Clark.

Duncan Clark

Here’s a bit of light relief from the hardcore end of the discussion. How Bad are Bananas? was written by Mike Berners-Lee, whose job is to help businesses understand the carbon footprint of individual products. If Chris Goodall’s book is looking at technological solutions, this is looking at more lifestyle based solutions – lifestyle decisions that might be made by individuals or considered by the government. [source]

87

The Great Disruption: Why the Climate Crisis Will Bring On the End of Shopping and the Birth of a New World

Paul Gilding

4.0

88

American War

Omar El Akkad, Dion Graham, et al

4.0

An audacious and powerful debut novel: a second American Civil War, a devastating plague, and one family caught deep in the middle a story that asks what might happen if America were to turn its most devastating policies and deadly weapons upon itself

Sarat Chestnut, born in Louisiana, is only six when the Second American Civil War breaks out in 2074. But even she knows that oil is outlawed, that L

89

Countdown: Our Last Best Hope for a Future on Earth?

Alan Weisman

4.0

90

Whole Earth Discipline: Why Dense Cities, Nuclear Power, Transgenic Crops, Restored Wildlands, and Geoengineering Are Necessary

Stewart Brand

4.0

"This is a very scary book by a very bright man, offering a picture of humanity's future that is both ominous and exhilarating."
-Edward O. Wilson

This eye-opening book by the legendary author of the National Book Award-winning Whole Earth Catalog persuasively details a new approach to our stewardship of the planet. Lifelong ecologist and futurist Stewart Brand relies on scientific rigor to shatt

Recommended by Matt Ridley.

Matt Ridley

It’s a paean for three things he thinks the environmental movement should adopt and has got wrong. One is nuclear power, the other is GM food and the third is cities. [source]

91

Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future

Bill McKibben

4.0

The bestselling author of The End of Nature issues an impassioned call to arms for an economy that creates community and ennobles our livesIn this powerful and provocative manifesto, Bill McKibben offers the biggest challenge in a generation to the prevailing view of our economy.

For the first time in human history, he observes, “more” is no longer synonymous with “better”—indeed, for many of us,

92

What We Know about Climate Change

Kerry Emanuel and Bob Inglis

4.0

An updated edition of a guide to the basic science of climate change, and a call to action.

The vast majority of scientists agree that human activity has significantly increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere--most dramatically since the 1970s. Yet global warming skeptics and ill-informed elected officials continue to dismiss this broad scientific consensus.
In this updated edition of his autho

93

Trail of Lightning (The Sixth World, #1)

Rebecca Roanhorse

4.0

While most of the world has drowned beneath the sudden rising waters of a climate apocalypse, Dinétah (formerly the Navajo reservation) has been reborn. The gods and heroes of legend walk the land, but so do monsters.

Maggie Hoskie is a Dinétah monster hunter, a supernaturally gifted killer. When a small town needs help finding a missing girl, Maggie is their last—and best—hope. But what Maggie unc

94

The Deplorables' Guide to Global Warming

Marc Morano

4.0

Less freedom. More regulation. Higher costs. Make no mistake: those are the surefire consequences of the modern global warming campaign waged by political and cultural elites, who have long ago abandoned fact-based science for dramatic fearmongering in order to push increased central planning. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Climate Change gives a voice -- backed by statistics, real-life storie

95

Energy and Civilization: A History

Vaclav Smil

4.0

A comprehensive account of how energy has shaped society throughout history, from pre-agricultural foraging societies through today's fossil fuel-driven civilization.

I wait for new Smil books the way some people wait for the next 'Star Wars' movie. In his latest book, Energy and Civilization: A History, he goes deep and broad to explain how innovations in humans' ability to turn energy into heat,

Recommended by Bill Gates and Chris Goodall.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Smil is one of my favorite authors, and this is his masterpiece. He lays out how our need for energy has shaped human history—from the era of donkey-powered mills to today’s quest for renewable energy. It’s not the easiest book to read, but at the end you’ll feel smarter and better informed about how energy innovation alters the course of civilizations. [source]

Chris Goodall

There isn’t a page you don’t learn something from. [source]

96

What the Eyes Don't See: A Story of Crisis, Resistance, and Hope in an American City

Mona Hanna-Attisha

4.0

The dramatic story of the Flint water crisis--an inspiring tale of scientific resistance by a relentless physician who stood up to power.

Flint was already a troubled city in 2014 when the state of Michigan--in the name of austerity--shifted the source of its water supply from Lake Huron to the Flint River. Soon after, citizens began complaining about the water that flowed from their taps--but offi

Recommended by Lexi Alexander.

Lexi Alexander

Congrats Doctor Hanna-Attisha. Well deserved. It’s a great book https://t.co/XgoMjECOOW [source]

97

Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We're in without Going Crazy

Joanna Macy, Chris Johnstone

4.0

The challenges we face can be difficult even to think about. Climate change, the depletion of oil, economic upheaval, and mass extinction together create a planetary emergency of overwhelming proportions. Active Hope shows us how to strengthen our capacity to face this crisis so that we can respond with unexpected resilience and creative power. Drawing on decades of teaching an empowerment approac

98

Chesapeake Requiem: A Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island

Earl Swift

4.0

A brilliant, soulful, and timely portrait of a two-hundred-year-old crabbing community in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay as it faces extinction from rising sea levels—part natural history of an extraordinary ecosystem, starring the beloved blue crab; part paean to a vanishing way of life; and part meditation on man’s relationship with the environment—from the acclaimed author, who reported this

99

Global Weirdness: Severe Storms, Deadly Heat Waves, Relentless Drought, Rising Seas and the Weather of the Future

Climate Central

4.0

Finally, in clear, accessible prose, a fascinating new book that explains climate change—its implications for the future and what we can and cannot do to avoid further change—to the layperson.

Produced by Climate Central, Inc.—a highly regarded independent, non-profit journalism and research organization founded in 2008—and reviewed by scientists at major educational and research institutions the w

100

The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival

John Vaillant

4.0

It’s December 1997, and a man-eating tiger is on the prowl outside a remote village in Russia’s Far East. The tiger isn’t just killing people, it’s annihilating them, and a team of men and their dogs must hunt it on foot through the forest in the brutal cold. As the trackers sift through the gruesome remains of the victims, they discover that these attacks aren’t random: the tiger is apparently en

Recommended by Ryan Holiday and TC Boyle.

Ryan Holiday

Author

Holy shit, this book is good. Just holy shit. Even if it was just the main narrative–the chase to kill a man-eating Tiger in Siberia in post-communist Russia–it would be worth reading, but it is so much more than that. The author explains the Russian psyche, the psyche of man vs predator, the psyches of primitive peoples and animals, in such a masterful way that you’re shocked to find 1) that he knows this, and 2) that he fit it all into this readable and relatively short book. You may have heard about the story on the internet a while back: a tiger starts killing people in Russia and a team is sent to kill it (Russia is so fucked up, they already have a team for this). At one point, the tiger is cornered and leaps to attack the team leader…and in mid-air the soldier’s rifle goes into the tigers open jaws and down his throat all the way to the stock, killing the tiger at the last possible second. The autopsy later revealed that the tiger had been shot something like a dozen times during its life and lived. The story is very similar to that of the Tsavo maneaters, which was turned into the underrated Val Kilmer movie The Ghost and the Darkness. There are all sorts of well-selected threads from evolutionary psychology and biology in this book and it makes the book a self-educator’s dream. You can pick and choose which ones you want to follow next–trusting safely that the author has pointed you in an interesting and valuable direction. But that’s just the meta-stuff that is a bonus with this book, and it’s worth pointing out only because the rest of the book is just so fucking interesting and exciting. [source]

TC Boyle

Sometimes nature strikes back, and in this book you really do root for the animal. [source]