Eight books about a planet in peril

Amitav Ghosh was born in Calcutta and grew up in India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. He studied in Delhi, Oxford and Alexandria. His most recent novel is Gun Island.

Ghosh is also the author of The Great Derangement; Climate Change and the Unthinkable, a work of non-fiction.

At the Guardian, he tagged eight notable books about a planet in peril, including:

How do we make sense of the Earth when it seems to be turning against us in revenge for its despoliation? The very act of writing about the devastation can sometimes create a kind of coherence. Elizabeth Kolbert shows us how with The Sixth Extinction, where she focuses on a few of the million or so species that are dying out in what is now known to be one of the greatest extinction events in the history of the Earth. The closeness of the focus creates a powerful sense of empathy, not just with the vanishing creatures but also with the writer as she struggles to account for the horrors to which she is bearing witness.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue