The inspirational story of a former Microsoft executive’s quest to build libraries around the world and share the love of books What’s happened since John Wood left Microsoft to change the world? Just ask six million kids in the poorest regions of Asia and Africa. In 1999, at the age of thirty-five, Wood quit a lucrative career to found the nonprofit Room to Read. Described by the San Francisco Chronicle as “the Andrew Carnegie of the developing world,” he strived to bring the lessons of the corporate world to the nonprofit sector—and succeeded spectacularly. In his acclaimed first book, Leaving Microsoft to Change the World, Wood explained his vision and the story of his start-up. Now, he tackles the organization’s next steps and its latest challenges—from managing expansion to raising money in a collapsing economy to publishing books for children who literally have no books in their native language. At its heart, Creating Room to Read shares moving stories of the people Room to Read works to help: impoverished children whose schools and villages have been swept away by war or natural disaster and girls whose educations would otherwise be ignored. People at the highest levels of finance, government, and philanthropy will embrace the opportunity to learn Wood’s inspiring business model and blueprint for doing good. And general readers will love Creating Room to Read for its spellbinding story of one man’s mission to put books within every child’s reach.

The updated seventh edition of the classic text on wood science and forestry The seventh edition of Forest Products and Wood Science: An Introduction offers a fully revised and updated review of the forest products industry. This classic text contains a comprehensive review of the subject and presents a thorough understanding of the anatomical and physical nature of wood. The authors emphasize its use as an industrial raw material. Forest Products and Wood Science provides thorough coverage of all aspects of wood science and industry, ranging from tree growth and wood anatomy to a variety of economically important wood products, along with their applications and performance. The text explores global raw materials, the increasing use of wood as a source of energy and chemicals and environmental implications of the use of wood. This edition features new material on structural composites, non-structural composites, durability and protection, pulp and paper, energy and chemicals, and global raw materials. This seventh edition of the classic work: Contains new information on a variety of topics including: structural composites, non-structural composites, durability and protection, pulp and paper, energy and chemicals and global raw materials Includes a fully revised text that meets the changing needs of the forestry, engineering, and wood science academics and professionals Presents material written by authors with broad experience in both the private and academic sectors Written for undergraduate students in forestry, natural resources, engineering, and wood science, as well as forest industry personnel, engineers, wood-based manufacturing and using professionals, the seventh edition of Forest Products and Wood Science updates the classic text that has become an indispensable resource.

Temperate rainforests are biogeographically unique. Compared to their tropical counterparts, temperate rainforests are rarer and are found disproportionately along coastlines. Because most temperate rainforests are marked by the intersection of marine, terrestrial, and freshwater systems, these rich ecotones are among the most productive regions on Earth. Globally, temperate rainforests store vast amounts of carbon, provide habitat for scores of rare and endemic species with ancient affinities, and sustain complex food-web dynamics. In spite of their global significance, however, protection levels for these ecosystems are far too low to sustain temperate rainforests under a rapidly changing global climate and ever expanding human footprint. Therefore, a global synthesis is needed to provide the latest ecological science and call attention to the conservation needs of temperate and boreal rainforests. A concerted effort to internationalize the plight of the world’s temperate and boreal rainforests is underway around the globe; this book offers an essential (and heretofore missing) tool for that effort. DellaSala and his contributors tell a compelling story of the importance of temperate and boreal rainforests that includes some surprises (e.g., South Africa, Iran, Turkey, Japan, Russia). This volume provides a comprehensive reference from which to build a collective vision of their future.

Ötzi the iceman could not do without wood when he was climbing his Alpine glacier, nor could medieval cathedral-builders or today's construction companies. From time immemorial, the skill of the human hand has developed by working wood, so much so that we might say that the handling of wood is a basic element in the history of the human body. The fear of a future wood famine became a panic in the 18th century and sparked the beginnings of modern environmentalism. This book traces the cultural history of wood and offers a highly original account of the connection between the raw material and the human beings who benefit from it. Even more, it shows that wood can provide a key for a better understanding of history, of the pecularities as well as the varieties of cultures, of a co-evolution of nature and culture, and even of the rise and fall of great powers. Beginning with Stone Age hunters, it follows the twists and turns of the story through the Middle Ages and the Industrial Revolution to the global society of the twenty-first century, in which wood is undergoing a varied and unexpected renaissance. Radkau is sceptical of claims that wood is about to disappear, arguing that such claims are self-serving arguments promoted by interest groups to secure cheaper access to, and control over, wood resources. The whole forest and timber industry often strikes the outsider as a world unto itself, a hermetically sealed black box, but when we lift the lid on this box, as Radkau does here, we will be surprised by what we find within. Wide-ranging and accessible, this rich historical analysis of one of our most cherished natural resources will find a wide readership.