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Endings: Encounters with Extinction
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
September 22, 2026
Neil Griffin’s Endings: Encounters with Extinction is the absolute definition of masterful Creative Non-Fiction. It is a rare, highly readable marriage of precise ecological science and deeply expressive, poetic reflection.
For me, this book was a complete breath of fresh air. Too often, the clinical nature of scientific prose can make you feel like you are being lectured at or cramming information for an exam. Conversely, pure nature poetry can sometimes feel so intensely emotive that you lose sight of the broader forest for the immediate tree right in front of you. Griffin bypasses both pitfalls by writing simultaneously as an objective scientist and a deeply creative essayist with a touch of the poetic soul.
I devoured this book in just three sittings. Once I fell into Griffin’s narrative, I wasn't just acquiring data; I was actively thinking and experiencing the weight of the text and translated to the location he has visited and seeing the animals that he was showing me. His structural pacing is artful: each chapter asks the tough questions by focusing tightly on the short-term loss of a single life, zooming out seamlessly to examine the macro-level systemic collapse, and then gently panning back in to reflect on what that loss means to him as an individual human being.
The prose is so visually compelling and the underlying storytelling so gripping that you completely forget you are reading a non-fiction text.
It is an urgent, beautifully balanced, and unforgettable journey.
For me, this book was a complete breath of fresh air. Too often, the clinical nature of scientific prose can make you feel like you are being lectured at or cramming information for an exam. Conversely, pure nature poetry can sometimes feel so intensely emotive that you lose sight of the broader forest for the immediate tree right in front of you. Griffin bypasses both pitfalls by writing simultaneously as an objective scientist and a deeply creative essayist with a touch of the poetic soul.
I devoured this book in just three sittings. Once I fell into Griffin’s narrative, I wasn't just acquiring data; I was actively thinking and experiencing the weight of the text and translated to the location he has visited and seeing the animals that he was showing me. His structural pacing is artful: each chapter asks the tough questions by focusing tightly on the short-term loss of a single life, zooming out seamlessly to examine the macro-level systemic collapse, and then gently panning back in to reflect on what that loss means to him as an individual human being.
The prose is so visually compelling and the underlying storytelling so gripping that you completely forget you are reading a non-fiction text.
It is an urgent, beautifully balanced, and unforgettable journey.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
I absolutely LOVED Endings by Neil Griffin, though I accept that not everyone will. The poets will say there is too much science. The scientists will say there is too much story-telling. The right will say he's a dippy liberal jaguar-hugger. The left will say he does too much observing and not enough acting.
Yes, there's science.
Yes, there is also poking fun at science writing.
Yes, there's history.
Yes, there's how history might have been different if they knew then what we know now.
Yes, there's poetry.
Yes, there's musing about what poets of ages past would have thought about this.
Yes, there are myths, lots and lots of myths from many ancient and not-so-ancient sources.
Yes, there's blunt, political commentary.
Yes, there is finger-pointing at the reader.
Yes, there are step-by-step instructions on how to subdue and gender-test a crocodile.
But overall there is a love for his subject and a very fun jumble of science and poetry and history and travel tales and animal adventures and harumphing that just really WORKS together, in spite of, or maybe because of, all of its moving parts.
Very highly recommended
Thank you so very much to NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Yes, there's science.
Yes, there is also poking fun at science writing.
Yes, there's history.
Yes, there's how history might have been different if they knew then what we know now.
Yes, there's poetry.
Yes, there's musing about what poets of ages past would have thought about this.
Yes, there are myths, lots and lots of myths from many ancient and not-so-ancient sources.
Yes, there's blunt, political commentary.
Yes, there is finger-pointing at the reader.
Yes, there are step-by-step instructions on how to subdue and gender-test a crocodile.
But overall there is a love for his subject and a very fun jumble of science and poetry and history and travel tales and animal adventures and harumphing that just really WORKS together, in spite of, or maybe because of, all of its moving parts.
Very highly recommended
Thank you so very much to NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
The book straddles the lines of being part research on other naturalist writers and the authors own personal experiences. The first several chapters fall flat because of the heavy use of other texts and lacking descriptions or odd descriptions like “Goth”. This felt like an attempt to be a Barry Lopez, Edward Abbey, or Peter Matthiessen (the latter two are mentioned in the book), but they feel as passionate or engrossing as the aforementioned author’s writings. However, the last two chapters, Hall of America and Adorno and the Tiger, the description s and analysis were in a completely different level. Griffin shows his abilities as a naturalist writer providing wonderful detail and rhetorical questions. While the book covers a very interesting topic, slogging through the first half isn’t worth the pay off of the final chapters and there are other books that cover the same topic which would be better for academic collections, but this is a decent popular science book that might be useful in public libraries who are looking for an introduction to the topic.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Absolutely STUNNING - one of the most beautiful and timely works of eco-poetic nonfiction I’ve read.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
A great read, of course the format was a bit choppy because it was a unpublished version but the writing style was entertaining and informative.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews