Most Popular Books by SY

"In loving yet unsentimental prose, Sy Montgomery captures the richness that animals bring to the human experience. Sometimes it takes a too-smart-for-his-own-good pig to open our eyes to what most matters in life.” —John Grogan, author of Marley & Me: Life and Love with the World’s Worst Dog A naturalist who spent months at a time living on her own among wild creatures in remote jungles, Sy Montgomery had always felt more comfortable with animals than with people. So she gladly opened her heart to a sick piglet who had been crowded away from nourishing meals by his stronger siblings. Yet Sy had no inkling that this piglet, later named Christopher Hogwood, would not only survive but flourish—and she soon found herself engaged with her small-town community in ways she had never dreamed possible. Unexpectedly, Christopher provided this peripatetic traveler with something she had sought all her life: an anchor (eventually weighing 750 pounds) to family and home. The Good Good Pig celebrates Christopher Hogwood in all his glory, from his inauspicious infancy to hog heaven in rural New Hampshire, where his boundless zest for life and his large, loving heart made him absolute monarch over a (mostly) peaceable kingdom. At first, his domain included only Sy’s cosseted hens and her beautiful border collie, Tess. Then the neighbors began fetching Christopher home from his unauthorized jaunts, the little girls next door started giving him warm, soapy baths, and the villagers brought him delicious leftovers. His intelligence and fame increased along with his girth. He was featured in USA Today and on several National Public Radio environmental programs. On election day, some voters even wrote in Christopher’s name on their ballots. But as this enchanting book describes, Christopher Hogwood’s influence extended far beyond celebrity; for he was, as a friend said, a great big Buddha master. Sy reveals what she and others learned from this generous soul who just so happened to be a pig—lessons about self-acceptance, the meaning of family, the value of community, and the pleasures of the sweet green Earth. The Good Good Pig provides proof that with love, almost anything is possible.

Tigers.

Boston Globe nature columnist discusses the lovelorn messages sent by singing insects on autumn evenings, the messages contained in spiderwebs, the effects of winter snow on the way sound travels, the way all life depends on the unusual structure of water, and much more. Most fun is the author''s description of ways to interact with other creatures (e.g., teaching wild birds to eat out of your hand).

Raised in a militant atheist family, Sy Garte fell in love with the factual world of science. He became a respected research biochemist with an anti-theistic worldview to bolster his work—and he had no intention of seeking a God he didn''t believe in. That is, until the very science he loved led him to question the validity of an atheistic worldview. His journey to answer the questions that confronted him drew him into becoming a fully committed Christian, determined to show others the truth: modern science doesn''t contradict God at all but instead supports Christianity. In the first half of the book, Sy begins with how his experiences and quest for knowledge as a student and early in his career brought him to question his materialist assumptions. He goes on to reveal how lessons from physics, biology, and human nature —all presented for lay readers to easily understand—actually argue for belief in God. In the second half of the book, Sy looks at the arguments often presented against God in academic and scientific settings and explains the false foundations on which they rest. For those who have been told that the realities of science call for a rejection of God—but can''t quite get rid of the feeling that this shouldn''t be true—The Works of His Hands is an ideal reminder that the two don''t have to be bitter enemies. Instead, this transformative book shares the beauty of the marriage between science and faith—and how, together, they can bring even the most unlikely to salvation.

By the acclaimed author of The Soul of an Octopus and the bestselling memoir The Good Good Pig. When Sy Montgomery ventured into the Amazon to unlock the mysteries of the littleknown pink dolphins, she found ancient whales that plied the Amazon River at dawn and dusk, swam through treetops in flooded forests, and performed underwater ballets with their flexible bodies. But she soon found out that to know the botos, as the dolphins are locally called, you must also know the people who live among them. And so in Journey of the Pink Dolphins, Montgomery—part naturalist, part poet, part Indiana Jones—winds her way through watery tributaries and riverside villages, searching for botos and hearing the tales of locals who believe these ethereal dolphins are shape-shifters—creatures that emerge from the water as splendidly dressed men or women only to enchant their human onlookers, capture their souls, and then carry them away to the Encante, an underwater world. Montgomery takes readers on four separate journeys, exploring the river-dwelling dolphins’ natural history, chronicling their conservation pressures, unraveling their prehistoric roots, and visiting with shamans who delve into the Encante.

Finalist for the National Book Award for Nonfiction * New York Times Bestseller * A Huffington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of the Year * One of the Best Books of the Month on Goodreads * Library Journal Best Sci-Tech Book of the Year * An American Library Association Notable Book of the Year “Sy Montgomery’s The Soul of an Octopus does for the creature what Helen Macdonald’s H Is for Hawk did for raptors.” —New Statesman, UK “One of the best science books of the year.” —Science Friday, NPR Another New York Times bestseller from the author of The Good Good Pig, this “fascinating…touching…informative…entertaining” (The Daily Beast) book explores the emotional and physical world of the octopus—a surprisingly complex, intelligent, and spirited creature—and the remarkable connections it makes with humans. In pursuit of the wild, solitary, predatory octopus, popular naturalist Sy Montgomery has practiced true immersion journalism. From New England aquarium tanks to the reefs of French Polynesia and the Gulf of Mexico, she has befriended octopuses with strikingly different personalities—gentle Athena, assertive Octavia, curious Kali, and joyful Karma. Each creature shows her cleverness in myriad ways: escaping enclosures like an orangutan; jetting water to bounce balls; and endlessly tricking companions with multiple “sleights of hand” to get food. Scientists have only recently accepted the intelligence of dogs, birds, and chimpanzees but now are watching octopuses solve problems and are trying to decipher the meaning of the animal’s color-changing techniques. With her “joyful passion for these intelligent and fascinating creatures” (Library Journal Editors’ Spring Pick), Montgomery chronicles the growing appreciation of this mollusk as she tells a unique love story. By turns funny, entertaining, touching, and profound, The Soul of an Octopus reveals what octopuses can teach us about the meeting of two very different minds.

If you are a leader or aspire to leadership over others you must read "Leaders, Power & Consequences." It clearly exposes the influences a leader has with people who are close and important to the leader. The leader is the person who holds the true power, that is, “the buck stops with them.” It is not underlings who act on behalf of another who dictates their actions. They are not the true power, and no one is long deceived. Where do problems in relationships, trivial or significant, not exist? The answer to resolving the problem is likely found where the power is located. Who are the true leaders, what are their expectations and how well do they communicate with those they lead? And, how well and candidly do those significant to the leader communicate directly back to the leader? This is where trust, safety and respect play a huge role in how the relationship plays out and either grows, mutually, or is destructive, mutually. Most leaders tend to communicate badly, have unspoken or inflexible expectations towards those they lead and blame others for what is the leader’s failings. "Leaders, Power & Consequences" confronts this problem of leadership directly and clearly by using Sy Ogulnick’s personally experienced stories. He clearly describes the path leaders must take if they are to personally grow, to understand themselves better, and in the process to contribute to the growth of those they lead. When authentic communication takes place between those in power and those immediately at the effect of this power, trust, safety and respect are felt by each. This must be found in the environment or Genuine Dialogue between them is impossible and will not, even at the point of a gun, take place. And it is the leaders who are primarily responsible for the creation of the environment. Words do not make it so, but action (behavior of the leaders) does. The path laid out in "Leaders, Power & Consequences" leads to facilitating problem-solving, creativity, innovation and a sense of mutual ownership amongst people to the degree that most leaders can only dream of.

Rather than discord between science and Christian faith, there is a harmony as grand as any choral masterpiece The idea that Christianity and science are inextricably in conflict is a relatively recent conception. However, with each new scientific discovery and scriptural insight, it''s an idea that''s being proved to be insupportable. Sy Garte has immersed himself in both science and faith and knows they work beautifully together to sing of the greatness of God. Now this respected scientist shares how God''s world (nature and science) and God''s word (made flesh in Christ) are bound together in loving harmony. In Science and Faith in Harmony, Garte examines modern scientific concepts and what they can teach us about theological truths, such as the dual nature of Christ. He explores the ways in which the terminology and language of science and faith consistently match each other. Despite his deep dives into theology and science, Garte does not get overly technical in his writing. Instead, he is personal and passionate, speaking directly to readers with a tone of joy and wonder, inviting them to join the chorus of praise to the Lord. Readers still wondering whether the truths of science and Christian faith are in conflict need this book. Following the path of Christ and holding a scientific worldview at the same time is not only possible but also leads to a fuller, richer life of harmony and truth.

This book is a child friendly story written by author "Sy Ari" about two friends that grew to like each other then soon love each other. Then one day they grow apart, only to one day meet again, maybe. With cool titles and interesting stories of reality situations that rhyme and can be sung along to. This book also provides original drawings that kids can color as they please.

Publisher Description

National Book Award finalist Sy Montgomery reflects on the personalities and quirks of 13 animals--her friends--who have profoundly affected her in this stunning, poetic, and life-affirming memoir featuring illustrations by Rebecca Green.

From the end of the Second World War through the U.S. Bicentennial, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Ford Foundation granted close to $300 million (approximately $2.3 billion in 2017 dollars) in the field of music alone. In deciding what to fund, these three grantmaking institutions decided to "ask the experts," adopting seemingly objective, scientific models of peer review and specialist evaluation. They recruited music composers at elite institutions, professors from prestigious universities, and leaders of performing arts organizations. Among the most influential expert-consultants were Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, Lukas Foss, and Milton Babbitt. The significance was two-fold: not only were male, Western art composers put in charge of directing large and unprecedented channels of public and private funds, but in doing so they also determined and defined what was meant by artistic excellence. They decided the fate of their peers and shaped the direction of music-making in this country. By asking the experts, the grantmaking institutions produced a concentrated and interconnected field of artists and musicians. Officers and directors utilized ostensibly objective financial tools like matching grants and endowments in an attempt to diversify and stabilize applicants'' sources of funding, as well as the number of applicants they funded. Such economics-based strategies, however, relied more on personal connections among the wealthy and elite, rather than local community citizens. Ultimately, this history demonstrates how "expertise" served as an exclusionary form of cultural and social capital that prevented racial minorities and non-dominant groups from fully participating.

From the beloved New York Times bestselling, Sibert Honor–winning author of the National Book Award finalist The Soul of an Octopus author comes a “beautiful…captivating” (Booklist, starred review) nonfiction picture book about the most exquisite and extraordinary of winged creatures—hummingbirds. The lightest birds in the sky, hummingbirds are capable of incredible feats, such as flying backwards, diving at speeds of sixty-one miles per hour, and beating their wings more than sixty times a second. The miraculous creatures are also incredibly vulnerable when they first emerge from their eggs. This book tells the story of a hummingbird’s early life and how they make their way into the world.

Meet the ladies: a flock of smart, affectionate, highly individualistic chickens who visit their favorite neighbors, devise different ways to hide from foxes, and mob the author like she''s a rock star. In these pages you''ll also meet Maya and Zuni, two orphaned baby hummingbirds who hatched from eggs the size of navy beans, and who are little more than air bubbles fringed with feathers. Their lives hang precariously in the balance-but with human help, they may one day conquer the sky. Snowball is a cockatoo whose dance video went viral on YouTube and who''s now teaching schoolchildren how to dance. You''ll meet Harris''s hawks named Fire and Smoke. And you''ll come to know and love a host of other avian characters who will change your mind forever about who birds really are. Each of these birds shows a different and utterly surprising aspect of what makes a bird a bird-and these are the lessons of Birdology: that birds are far stranger, more wondrous, and at the same time more like us than we might have dared to imagine. In Birdology, beloved author of The Good Good Pig Sy Montgomery explores the essence of the otherworldly creatures we see every day. By way of her adventures with seven birds-wild, tame, exotic, and common-she weaves new scientific insights and narrative to reveal seven kernels of bird wisdom. The first lesson of Birdology is that, no matter how common they are, Birds Are Individuals, as each of Montgomery''s distinctive Ladies clearly shows. In the leech-infested rain forest of Queensland, you''ll come face to face with a cassowary-a 150-pound, man-tall, flightless bird with a helmet of bone on its head and a slashing razor-like toenail with which it (occasionally) eviscerates people-proof that Birds Are Dinosaurs. You''ll learn from hawks that Birds Are Fierce; from pigeons, how Birds Find Their Way Home; from parrots, what it means that Birds Can Talk; and from 50,000 crows who moved into a small city''s downtown, that Birds Are Everywhere. They are the winged aliens who surround us. Birdology explains just how very "other" birds are: Their hearts look like those of crocodiles. They are covered with modified scales, which are called feathers. Their bones are hollow. Their bodies are permeated with extensive air sacs. They have no hands. They give birth to eggs. Yet despite birds'' and humans'' disparate evolutionary paths, we share emotional and intellectual abilities that allow us to communicate and even form deep bonds. When we begin to comprehend who birds really are, we deepen our capacity to approach, understand, and love these otherworldly creatures. And this, ultimately, is the priceless lesson of Birdology: it communicates a heartfelt fascination and awe for birds and restores our connection to these complex, mysterious fellow creatures

Sy Montgomery--acclaimed author of The Soul of an Octopus and bestselling memoir The Good Good Pig--has shared with readers her amazing encounters with intelligent octopi, great apes, man-eating tigers, and pink river dolphins, but here her muse is an animal whose name and appearance evoke another world altogether. Southeast Asia''s golden moon bear, with its luminous coat, lionlike mane, and Mickey Mouse ears, was unknown to science--until Montgomery and her colleagues got on the trail at the dawn of the new millennium. Search for the Golden Moon Bear recounts Montgomery''s quest--fraught with danger and mayhem--to reconstruct an evolutionary record and piece together a living portrait of her littleknown subject. This beautiful animal is not just a scientific eureka! It is also a powerful symbol of conservation. Search for the Golden Moon Bear is a field report from the frontiers of science and the ends of the earth, seamlessly weaving together folklore, natural history, and contemporary research into fantastic travelogue.

"From the beloved New York Times bestselling author of The Soul of an Octopus, a perfect gem of a book about those most exquisite and extraordinary of winged creatures--hummingbirds."--

C.1 ST. AID. JR. LIBRARY GUILD. 08-25-2009. $18.00.

Does the ocean ever freeze? How did the pistol shrimp get its name? Answers to these and many other questions in this handy question-and-answer guide to life forms thriving along the ocean''s edge.

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * NATIONAL BESTSELLER * AMAZON EDITOR’S PICK and BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR * INDIE BESTSELLER * A SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE''S BEST SCIENCE BOOK OF THE YEAR * THE WASHINGTON POST''S BEST NONFICTION OF THE YEAR PICK * A NEW SCIENTIST BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR *THE PERFECT GIFT FOR NATURE LOVERS * INCLUDES GORGEOUS ARTWORK * "Montgomery''s heart-tugging conversations with teammates and her commitment to helping an octogenarian named Fire Chief reveal turtles to be perfect conduits for meditations on aging, disability and chosen family.” —Scientific American National Book Award finalist for The Soul of an Octopus and New York Times bestseller Sy Montgomery turns her journalistic curiosity to the wonder and wisdom of our long-lived cohabitants—turtles—and through their stories of hope and rescue, reveals to us astonishing new perspectives on time and healing. For fans of The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year and An Immense World. When acclaimed naturalist Sy Montgomery and wildlife artist Matt Patterson arrive at Turtle Rescue League, they are greeted by hundreds of turtles recovering from injury and illness. Endangered by cars and highways, pollution and poachers, these turtles—with wounds so severe that even veterinarians would have dismissed them as fatal—are given a second chance at life. The League’s founders, Natasha and Alexxia, live by one motto: Never give up on a turtle. But why turtles? What is it about them that inspires such devotion? Ancient and unhurried, long-lived and majestic, their lineage stretches back to the time of the dinosaurs. Some live to two hundred years, or longer. Others spend months buried under cold winter water. Montgomery turns to these little understood yet endlessly surprising creatures to probe the eternal question: How can we make peace with our time? In pursuit of the answer, Sy and Matt immerse themselves in the delicate work of protecting turtle nests, incubating eggs, rescuing sea turtles, and releasing hatchlings to their homes in the wild. We follow the snapping turtle Fire Chief on his astonishing journey as he battles against injuries incurred by a truck. Hopeful and optimistic, Of Time and Turtles is an antidote to the instability of our frenzied world. Elegantly blending science, memoir, and philosophy, and drawing on cultures from across the globe, this compassionate portrait of injured turtles and their determined rescuers invites us all to slow down and slip into turtle time. Perfect gift for nature lovers. Includes a signature of photos plus stunning, photo-realistic full color paintings and black-and-white chapter opener art by wildlife artist Matt Patterson. Read more books by Sy Montgomery such as How to Be a Good Creature and The Soul of an Octopus. Don''t miss The Book of Turtles for children.

Award-winning and best-selling author Sy Montgomery turns her talents to the story of California condors and the scientists who have fought against their extinction.

Describes the research that Patricia Medici and her team are doing on researching tapir in Brazil.

Describes the cheetah''s essential role in the ecosystem and the ways in which Namibia''s Cheetah Conservation Fund is promoting cohabitation between cheetahs and farmers.

“Montgomery’s expertise and the gorgeous illustrations make this a fine purchase for libraries serving early elementary students.” —School Library Journal “The mixed-media illustrations make good use of dynamic spreads, color, and texture—perfect for a book on a master of camouflage. Montgomery seamlessly incorporates interesting facts about octopuses into the narrative.” —Booklist Learn all about Inky the Octopus, an international sensation known for escaping from the New Zealand aquarium in April 2016, in this fascinating picture book from National Book Award nominee and octopus expert Sy Montgomery. Inky had been at the New Zealand aquarium since 2014 after being taken in by a fisherman who found him at sea. Inky had been getting used to his new environment, but the staff quickly figured out that he had to be kept amused or he would get bored. Then one night in 2016 Inky, about the size of a basketball, decided he’d had enough. He slithered eight feet across the floor and down a drainpipe more than 160 feet long to his home in the sea. Acclaimed author Sy Montogmery reminds readers that Inky didn’t escape—but instead, like the curious animal he is, wanted to explore the rest of the vast ocean he called his home.

This book reminds students in junior, senior and graduate level courses in physics, chemistry and engineering of the math they may have forgotten (or learned imperfectly) which is needed to succeed in science courses. The focus is on math actually used in physics, chemistry and engineering, and the approach to mathematics begins with 12 examples of increasing complexity, designed to hone the student''s ability to think in mathematical terms and to apply quantitative methods to scientific problems. By the author''s design, no problems are included in the text, to allow the students to focus on their science course assignments. - Highly accessible presentation of fundamental mathematical techniques needed in science and engineering courses - Use of proven pedagogical techniques develolped during the author''s 40 years of teaching experience - Illustrations and links to reference material on World-Wide-Web - Coverage of fairly advanced topics, including vector and matrix algebra, partial differential equations, special functions and complex variables

"A luxe, full color picture book adaptation of Sy Montgomery and Rebecca Green''s New York Times bestselling How to Be a Good Creature"--

When Temple Grandin was born, her parents knew that she was different. Years later she was diagnosed with autism. While Temple’s doctor recommended a hospital, her mother believed in her. Temple went to school instead. Today, Dr. Temple Grandin is a scientist and professor of animal science at Colorado State University. Her world-changing career revolutionized the livestock industry. As an advocate for autism, Temple uses her experience as an example of the unique contributions that autistic people can make. This compelling biography complete with Temple’s personal photos takes us inside her extraordinary mind and opens the door to a broader understanding of autism.