John McPhee
American writer and pioneer of creative nonfiction and New Journalism, long-time contributor to The New Yorker; author of widely read works on geology, nature, and profiles such as Coming into the Country, Encounters with the Archdruid, The Control of Nature, and the Pulitzer Prize–winning Annals of the Former World (1999).
Books
This list of books are ONLY the books that have been ranked on the lists that are aggregated on this site. This is not a comprehensive list of all books by this author.
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1. The Founding Fish
A Natural History of the American Shad
A lyrical blend of natural history, reportage and personal narrative that follows the American shad — its anadromous lifecycle, habits and biology — while tracing the fish’s outsized role in colonial and early American diets, commerce and local identity; through fishing excursions, conversations with anglers and scientists, and archival research, the book illuminates how abundance once shaped communities, how dams, pollution and overfishing precipitated decline, and why this single species reveals broader truths about landscape, history and conservation.
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