Cosying with a good book and a tipple of your choice on a miserable evening is one of Winters great pleasures. When the trees are all bare of leaves, and the afternoons are dark, a book about nature and wildlife can really lift the spirits, and make you think of longer days and warmer weather.
BBC Discover Wildlife Magazine wildlife expert Ben Hoare rounds up his favourite wildlife and nature books of 2025 to warm your cockles and keep you entertained this Winter, whether for you or a loved one.
Best wildlife books of 2025
Is a River Alive?
By Robert Macfarlane, Hamish Hamilton, £25
There’s a mic-drop moment near the start of Robert Macfarlane’s latest spellbinding work of non- fiction. He refers to “rivers who”. At a stroke, his choice of pronoun gives life – personality even – to the flowing waters on which we all depend. Macfarlane then introduces us to the global campaign to grant personhood and legal rights to rivers and other natural entities, such as forests and mountains.
He reveals how this highly radical but ancient idea can transform the way we think and feel about the more-than-human world, leading to better protection for the environment. The book’s wild, beating heart is an account of three journeys to magnificent river systems in Ecuador, India and Canada, all imperilled, in the company of the heroes battling to save them. The writing is urgent and deeply moving, and features thrilling descriptions of people and places, poetry and humour too. Unputdownable.
Check availability at Amazon, World of Books, and Waterstones.
To Have or to Hold
By Sophie Pavelle, Bloomsbury, £20
Parasites get star billing in Sophie Pavelle’s chunky and detailed, yet refreshingly playful, investigation of symbiosis. This is a subject TV producers love, where different species forge close relationships, not always to their mutual benefit.
But unlike the average TV documentary, Pavelle sidesteps easy explanations. There are surprises at every turn as she delves into wondrous and messy relationships involving a cast of unsung species that we tend to overlook, from lichens and rare hoverflies to parasitic barnacles and hairworms.
Check availability at World of Books, Waterstones, and Amazon.
No Paradise With Wolves
By Katie Stacey, Collective Ink, £15.99
Katie Stacey tells the story of how she and her boyfriend Luke moved to northern Spain’s verdant Asturias mountains to rewild a dairy farm. Cash is tight and locals are sceptical, wary of wildlife conservation in a region where wolves have long been persecuted.
Undeterred, the couple stick at it, learning by trial and error. They are driven by a deep love for the land and an evolving vision of their little farm as both a family home and a thriving ecosystem for wild and domestic species. Wonderfully life-affirming.
Check availability at Amazon, and Waterstones.
The Cuckoo's Lea
By Michael Warren, Bloomsbury, £20
On the face of it, The Cuckoo’s Lea is about the myriad ways in which birds have inspired English place names. But it’s much more than that.
Michael Warren is not only a superb nature writer but also a detective, who uses maps, medieval charters, parish records, Old English poetry and his own explorations to show how cuckoos and crows, owls and hawks, among many other birds, are woven into the cultural fabric of England. This is a phenomenal book that brings the past to life and makes you see landscapes anew.
Check availability at Bookshop.org, World of Books, Waterstones, and Amazon.
Homeward Bound
By Hamza Yassin, Gala, £22
Every page of this warm-hearted cuddle of a book is full to the brim with the joy of nature. The genial Hamza Yassin shares anecdotes from his life as a wildlife camera operator and presenter, together with fascinating titbits on the natural history of various British habitats. His enthusiasm is infectious.
Check availability at Amazon, World of Books, Waterstones, and Bookshop.org.
Intertidal
By Yuvan Aves, Ithaka Press, £22
uvan Aves is a conservationist, activist and fantastic nature writer. Intertidal sees him mix observations of the people and wildlife of the urban coast in Chennai, India, with profound meditations on climate change, life and much else. Aves is the only author from south Asia to have been shortlisted for the prestigious Wainwright Prize – and, we hope, the first of many.
Check availability at Waterstones, Amazon, and World of Books.
Land Beneath the Waves
By Nic Wilson, Summersdale, £18.99
There’s a simplistic notion that nature heals anything and everyone – but you won’t find it in this beautiful and brave memoir. Nic Wilson has instead written a nuanced, painfully honest account of the day-to- day reality of living with chronic illness, showing the remarkable ways that nature helps her, without being a cure-all.
Check availability at Waterstones, and Amazon.
Neurodivergent by Nature
By Joe Harkness, Bloomsbury, £18.99
For his second book, Joe Harkness, a special educational needs teacher who himself has ADHD, thoughtfully recounts his experiences in nature and blends them with the insights of other neurodivergent nature lovers. He avoids the ‘neurodivergence is a superpower’ narrative. What emerges is complex and revelatory.
Check availability at World of Books, Amazon, and Waterstones.
The best children's wildlife books of 2025
Getting children into nature from an early age can inspire a lifetime of wonderful experiences in the great outdoors, or maybe even a career choice.
Frog: A Story of Life on Earth
By Isabel Thomas, Bloomsbury, £12.99
volution is surely the most amazing story of all, but among the hardest to tell well. And to engage five and six- year-olds with the complex mechanics of natural selection is harder still. Enter science writer Isabel Thomas. Inspired by a question her son asked – “If frogs come from eggs, and eggs come from frogs, where did the first frog come from?” – she has produced a stunning picture book that is nothing less than the story of everything.
Each spread features dreamily immersive artwork by Daniel Egnéus and just three or four lines of text. Yet we are effortlessly whisked from the big bang to the emergence of living things and the evolution of animals until, finally, frogs leap onto the page. Readers are left with the thought that they, too, are part of the never-ending evolution story. Bound to become a firm favourite in primary school classrooms.
Check availability at Amazon and Waterstones.
Choose Your Own Evolution
By Jules Howard, Nosy Crow, £14.99
Science writer Jules Howard had the genius idea to turn the choose-your- own-adventure book format into this brilliantly compelling guide to evolution.
Starting with the blob-like Dickinsonia, 570 million years ago, you decide whether to, say, develop a backbone, become nocturnal or take to the trees, before finding out if your chosen evolutionary path leads to extinction or you survive to the present. Beautifully illustrated by Gordy Wright and ideal for readers aged 7+. Evolution has never been this fun!
Check availability at Waterstones, Amazon, and Bookshop.org.
Life
By Jennifer N R Hudson, Thames and Hudson, £16.99
With sumptuous artwork by illustrator/author Jennifer N R Smith, this supersized book is one to pore over. The well-judged text breaks down the concept of biodiversity for readers aged 7+, introducing themes such as species adaptation, biomes, food webs and symbiosis.
Like its predecessors Glow and Bang (about bioluminescence and volcanic activity respectively), Life uses neon ink, lending the book a celebratory feel that suits its subject. A gorgeous contemporary version of the treasuries of nature of old.
Check availability at Amazon and Waterstones.
- What's the most common bird of prey in the UK?
- It skims the moors like a ghost, sports a wingspan wider than your outstretched arms and can drop on prey with pinpoint precision
- It weighs as much as house cat, has a wingspan the size of an average door and can hit 100 miles per hour when hunting - that's one formidable predator
