Evolutionary Wars: The Battle of Species on Land, at Sea, and in the Air

by Charles Kingsley Levy, Trudy Nicholson

Walk through pages of Earth's most revolutionary and evolutionary creatures who fight to survive, from the death-machine dragonfly to killer frogs to vicious viruses. It's a fascinating, fearful world out there! 94 illustrations.

Genres: Science, Nature, Evolution, Nonfiction

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

Reviews

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Goes into detail about a lot of different life forms but not quite what I expected. I thought the author would include more information about what evolutionary traits eventually went away or were no longer practical based on the title. Instead the book focused on explaining how various species use different evolutionary traits to survive and had often had a focus on how various traits relate to WWII flying (the author was a WWII pilot).

I found myself struggling to read more than a few dozens pages at a time due to the quantity of information. However, the book is well written and the illustrations are beautiful. I particularly liked the quips the author would occasionally throw in such as “[Gymnids] even seem to show a level of civility missing in today’s human society; for example, one Gymnid will signal and ask nearby fish to stop signaling and they will comply temporarily out of courtesy”.