What Species of Creatures: Animal Relations From The New World (Sharon Kirsch)

Can't say enough about it. I'm not even half way through, but couldn't wait to recommend it. More here. Get it via Amazon, or order directly. And yes, New Star Books is also home to my own imprint ( series, more precisely), known as Transmontanus.

About What Species of Creatures:

"The Europeans who colonized North America more than three centuries ago encountered fantastical creatures: flying squirrels, ruby–throated hummingbirds, the easily tamed beaver. Their literature of discovery – by turns comic, cruel, and adulatory – provides a revealing glimpse of the taxonomies they carried with them into their so–called New World.Sharon Kirsch weaves early settler accounts, fables, children's stories, natural histories and 21st century science in a quirky narrative that probes our complicated relationship with the other creatures that share the planet."