From the voices of climate activists to a Pulitzer prize-winner, this year’s selection of longlisted books are a rallying cry to protect and value our wildlife and planet. Educational, insightful and fascinating, the most astute and important of conservation voices can be found below. From ecosystems, to agriculture, animals, and plants, the 2023 longlist is an urgent exploration of our complex and essential natural world.
Beastly: A New History of Animals and Us, Keggie Carew 
Beastly is the 40,000-year story of our changing kinship with the animal world – from the smallest microbe to the largest creature that ever lived. Exploring this relationship through history, culture, science and inspiring examples, Carew makes the passionate case that animals are the key to the planet’s health, but only if we can save them.
Rewilding the Sea: How to Save Our Oceans, Charles Clover
Rewilding the Sea celebrates what happens when we step aside and let nature repair the damage. Charles Clover chronicles how determined individuals are proving that the crisis in our oceans can be reversed, with benefits for entire ecosystems. This essential book propels us to rethink our relationship with nature and reveals that saving our oceans is easier than we think.
The Orchid Outlaw, Ben Jacob
On a mission to save Britain’s endangered native orchids, Ben Jacob broke into building sites in the dead of night to rescue threatened plants, turned his kitchen into a laboratory, his fridge into storage for hundreds of baby flowers, and his back yard into a plantation. But doing all this put him on the wrong side of the law…
Elixir: In the Valley at the End of Time, Kapka Kassabova
Set in the valley of the Mesta, one of the oldest inhabited river valleys in Europe and a nexus for wild plant gatherers, Elixir is an unforgettable exploration of the deep connections between people, plants and place.
Rooted: How Regenerative Farming Can Change the World, Sarah Langford
In Rooted, Sarah Langford weaves her own personal story around those who taught her what it means to be a farmer. She illuminates the humanity and the difficulties of modern farming and introduces a new generation of farmers on a path of regenerative change, ultimately showing how land connects us all through community, health, and our planet.
Birdgirl, Mya-Rose Craig
Twenty-one-year-old British-Bangladeshi birder, environmentalist and activist Mya-Rose Craig is an international force. In her moving memoir, Birdgirl, she chronicles her mother’s struggle with mental illness and how her family used birds to cope, and shares her passion for social justice and fierce dedication to preserving our planet.
Black Ops and Beaver Bombing: Adventures with Britain’s Wild Mammals, Fiona Mathews and Tim Kendall
Britain is teeming with wildlife, often in the most unexpected places. There are stone mines where bats hang out with pot-smoking teenagers and water voles thrive without water in Glaswegian parklands. Our coastlines are laden with seals. That’s the good news. The bad news is that a quarter of British mammals are at imminent risk of extinction.
Tim Kendall and Fiona Mathews, author of the government’s official census of British mammals, take us on a safari unlike any other, from Scotland to the Isles of Scilly in search of their elusive subjects.
Sarn Helen: A Journey Through Wales, Past, Present and Future, Tom Bullough, illustrated by Jackie Morris
From the author of Addlands, and featuring illustrations by Jackie Morris, Sarn Helen is an immersive and evocative non-fictional journey through Wales and a revelatory meditation on the nation’s past, present and future.
Forget Me Not, Sophie Pavelle
As climate change drives dozens of plants and animals towards extinction, are we forgetting them? Determined to ignite awareness of the environmental crisis, Sophie Pavelle embarked on low-carbon trips to see ten rare native species. A wild, joyful odyssey, Forget Me Not is a clarion call for action and hope.
Fen, Bog and Swamp: A Short History of Peatland Destruction and its Role in the Climate Crisis, Annie Proulx
Fens, bogs, swamps and marine estuaries are the earth’s most desirable and dependable resources. Pulitzer Prize winner Annie Proulx explores their vital role in preserving the environment, and their systemic destruction in the pursuit of profit. This is both a revelatory history and an urgent plea for wetland reclamation, from one of our greatest prose stylists.
The Lost Rainforests of Britain, Guy Shrubsole
Temperate rainforest may once have covered up to one-fifth of Britain, inspiring Celtic druids, Welsh wizards, Romantic poets, and Arthur Conan Doyle’s most loved creations.
In this awe-inspiring investigation, Guy Shrubsole travels through the Western Highlands and the Lake District, down to the rainforests of Wales, Devon, and Cornwall to map these spectacular lost worlds for the first time.
This is the extraordinary tale of one person’s quest to find Britain’s lost rainforests – and bring them back.
Nomad Century: How to Survive the Climate Upheaval, Gaia Vince
Nomad Century is an urgent investigation of the most underreported, seismic consequence of climate change: how it will force us to change where – and how – we live. While the climate catastrophe is finally getting the attention it deserves, the inevitability of mass migration has been largely ignored. Here, Vince provides, for the first time, an examination of the most pressing question facing humanity.