In 1348 a Franciscan friar from Kilkenny, a chronicler obsessed with the meaning of time, witnesses the coming of the Black Death to Ireland. This novel is his story-a man of faith, in a darkened universe, challenged to believe in the flesh. F. X. Mathews conjures up historical events-the freezing of the River Liffey, the Kyteler witchcraft trial, the beaching of the great whales, the plague-in haunting images that reverberate with the intensity of myth. His friar, the native Irish girl from the mountains, Medbh, and Colm, the dream-bewildered, island-dwelling tinker boy, figure in an uncommon love story played out, in a time of miracles and madness, against the end of time. F. X. MATHEWS is a professor emeritus of English at the University of Rhode Island and the author of two other novels, The Concrete Judasbird and The Frog in the Bottom of the Well. Of The Frog the critics wrote: "F. X. Mathews, whose talent sings like an angelic choir . . . draws character and scene with a dark, impressionistic incisiveness . . ." -The Boston Globe "A strong and compassionate definition of personalities within the press of circumstances illuminates this obsessive mythic tale . . . brilliantly conceived . . ." -Kirkus Reviews ." . . a grim but moving study of both the innocence and the mindless cruelties of childhood . . ." -Publishers'Weekly "Mathews can work up some stunning scenes . . ." -Newsweek ." . . a religious psychodrama that fulfills its ominous portents . . .chill tour de force . . ." -N. Y. Times Book Review

A child's dream about the danger threatening the whales leads him to imagine planting and cultivating a garden in which new whales grow. Reissue.

Everybody Out of the Pond At the Water's Edge will change the way you think about your place in the world. The awesome journey of life's transformation from the first microbes 4 billion years ago to Homo sapiens today is an epic that we are only now beginning to grasp. Magnificent and bizarre, it is the story of how we got here, what we left behind, and what we brought with us. We all know about evolution, but it still seems absurd that our ancestors were fish. Darwin's idea of natural selection was the key to solving generation-to-generation evolution -- microevolution -- but it could only point us toward a complete explanation, still to come, of the engines of macroevolution, the transformation of body shapes across millions of years. Now, drawing on the latest fossil discoveries and breakthrough scientific analysis, Carl Zimmer reveals how macroevolution works. Escorting us along the trail of discovery up to the current dramatic research in paleontology, ecology, genetics, and embryology, Zimmer shows how scientists today are unveiling the secrets of life that biologists struggled with two centuries ago. In this book, you will find a dazzling, brash literary talent and a rigorous scientific sensibility gracefully brought together. Carl Zimmer provides a comprehensive, lucid, and authoritative answer to the mystery of how nature actually made itself.

Describes whle sharks, discussing where and how they live and their size, important body parts, diet, and babies.

When Samuel Zemurray arrived in America in 1891, he was gangly and penniless. When he died in New Orleans 69 years later, he was among the richest men in the world. He conquered the United Fruit Company, and is a symbol of the best and worst of the United States.

A child and a whale embark on a beautiful journey together in this lyrical, gorgeously illustrated picture book about friendship, hope, and love for the world around us in the vein of The Fisherman & the Whale and Cynthia Rylant’s Life. Where land becomes sky and sky becomes sea, I first saw the whale and the whale first saw me. A child joins a friendly whale for a magical journey of discovery. They sail the blue ocean, dance with dolphins, and tail-splash seagulls. But the child also sees an ocean filled with plastic trash. And that inspires a promise of help, for the whale and all earth’s creatures.

A moving, poetic story about a whale in captivity who longs for the ocean . . . because whales don't belong in fishbowls, do they? Wednesday is a whale who lives in a fishbowl smack dab in the middle of a city--it's the only home she's ever known. Cars whizz around her and people hurry past; even the sun and moon circle above. But if she leaps high enough out of her bowl, Wednesday can see it: a calm bit of blue off in the distance. When a girl in a paisley dress tells Wednesday "You belong in the sea," the whale starts to wonder, what is the sea? Readers will cheer--and get all choked up-- when, one day, Wednesday leaps higher than ever before and sets in motion a breathtaking chain of events that will carry her to her rightful home. Touching, and ultimately uplifting, here is a story about a lonely creature longing to be free--and longing to find someone just like her. A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2018! A New York Public Library Best Book of 2018!