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A thrilling exploration of nature's symbiotic relationships, some comforting and familiar, others wildly alien, by the award-winning author of Forget Me Not.
What can nature teach us about living together? Investigating eight symbiotic relationships trying to survive the climate and biodiversity crises, Sophie Pavelle explains why it has never been more vital for us to understand symbiosis. Symbiotic relationships regulate ecosystems, strengthen resilience and bind pivotal connections.
Species living together in symbiosis is no accident – these dynamics evolved. Species form and sever alliances everywhere, from deep within temperate rainforests to the open ocean, quiet tidal pools or chalk grasslands, and nature thrives on relationships as glamorous as they are grotesque and as bizarre as they are engrossing.
In To Have or To Hold, Sophie relishes the interconnectedness between species and celebrates the relationships that underpin natural environments. Low-carbon travelling around the British Isles, she presents nature's frauds, fortune-tellers, misfits and cheaters.
The natural world is built on parasitism, a cunning blend of bargaining and exploitation in the name of survival. In our relationship with the natural world, are we the parasites? Will we continue to exploit nature's resources? Or will we vow to love and cherish what remains – shaping a more restorative life alongside nature – till death us do part?
Prologue
Me, The Moon
Relationship status: unrequited
1 + 1 = 1
The Mint Sauce Worm + The Algae = Animalgae
Relationship status: rather not say
Misfits
The Ocean Sunfish (and Others)
Relationship status: friends with benefits
The Trojan Horse
The Shore Crab and The Barnacle
Relationship status: just seeing each other
A Cad and A Bounder
The Early Spider Orchid and The Buffish Mining Bee
Relationship status: it's complicated
All Rise
The Hair Worm and [insert host here]
Relationship status: unhinged
Killing Me Softly
The Aspen, The Aspen Bracket Fungus and The Aspen Hoverfly
Relationship status: situationship
The Sleeper Agent
The Lungwort Lichen
Relationship status: throuple
Terms & Conditions
The Colony (of the Narrow-Headed Ant)
Relationship status: frenemies
Epilogue
The One-hit Wonder?
Relationship status: working on it
Sophie Pavelle is a US-born and UK-based science communicator. She worked for Beaver Trust and presented their award-winning documentary Beavers Without Borders. She is an Ambassador for The Wildlife Trusts and sat on the RSPB England Advisory Committee. Her writing has appeared in The Guardian, National Geographic Traveller, New Scientist, The Independent and BBC magazines. Her first book, Forget Me Not, was widely praised for encouraging action against climate change and biodiversity loss.
