Inspired by Borges’s Book of Fictional Creatures (first published in 1967), British writer Caspar Henderson compiled a modern bestiary. This is a voluminous work dedicated to the strangest and most mysterious creatures that now inhabit our planet: from the “smiling” axolotl salamander described by Pliny to the yeti crab, discovered only in 2005, living practically in boiling water at great depths. Each chapter is an intricate, but logically well-built network of the latest scientific facts, mythology, biology, paleontology, anthropology, philosophy, literature, religion, as well as lyrical digressions and lengthy reflections of the author on the topic of evolution in general and humanity in particular. The book is beautifully translated and extravagantly designed.
Alpina non-fiction, Dynasty, 524 p., 2015