The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History

From the author of Field Notes from a Catastrophe comes a powerful and important work about the future of our world — blending intellectual history, natural history, and vivid field reporting into a compelling account of the mass extinction unfolding before our eyes.

Over the past half billion years, there have been five mass extinctions — events during which the diversity of life on Earth suddenly and dramatically collapsed. Now, scientists across the globe are documenting the sixth extinction, predicted to be the most devastating since the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. This time, however, the cataclysm is caused by us.

Drawing on research from dozens of scientists — geologists studying ocean cores, botanists tracking the tree line in the Andes, and marine biologists diving on the Great Barrier Reef — Elizabeth Kolbert takes readers into the field to witness the changes firsthand. She introduces a dozen species, some already lost and others on the brink, illustrating how human activity is reshaping the planet’s biodiversity.

Through these stories, Kolbert delivers a moving, urgent account of the disappearances happening all around us and traces how our understanding of extinction has evolved — from Georges Cuvier’s discoveries in revolutionary Paris to today’s global environmental crises.

The Sixth Extinction is both a chronicle of our impact and a profound meditation on what it means to be human in an age of irreversible change.