Best Nonfiction Biology books on Goodreads
5. 
The Hot Zone: The Terrifying True Story of the Origins of the Ebola Virus
by:
Richard Preston
4.16 avg rating — 119,587 ratings 6. 
7. 
Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams
by:
Matthew Walker
4.37 avg rating — 215,792 ratings 
9. 
The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World
by:
Michael Pollan
4.06 avg rating — 58,655 ratings 10. 
Survival of the Sickest: A Medical Maverick Discovers Why We Need Disease
by:
Sharon Moalem
4.14 avg rating — 8,939 ratings 11. 
Parasite Rex: Inside the Bizarre World of Nature's Most Dangerous Creatures
by:
Carl Zimmer
4.20 avg rating — 5,906 ratings 
13. 
Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures
by:
Merlin Sheldrake
4.33 avg rating — 47,239 ratings 
17. 
The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate: Discoveries from a Secret World
by:
Peter Wohlleben
4.07 avg rating — 84,784 ratings 
20. 
Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution
by:
Michael J. Behe
3.79 avg rating — 4,017 ratings 
26. 
The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic—and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World
by:
Steven Johnson
3.89 avg rating — 55,253 ratings 
30. 
The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution
by:
Richard Dawkins
4.16 avg rating — 55,478 ratings 31. 
Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life
by:
Nick Lane
4.25 avg rating — 3,634 ratings 32. 
The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs: A New History of a Lost World
by:
Steve Brusatte
4.21 avg rating — 38,329 ratings 32. 
35. 
The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution
by:
Richard Dawkins
4.14 avg rating — 28,421 ratings 36. 
37. 
The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal
by:
Jared Diamond
4.08 avg rating — 28,335 ratings 
41. 
Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void
by:
Mary Roach
3.95 avg rating — 59,464 ratings 
43. 
The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature
by:
Steven Pinker
4.09 avg rating — 25,079 ratings 44. 
Missing Microbes: How the Overuse of Antibiotics Is Fueling Our Modern Plagues
by:
Martin J. Blaser
4.16 avg rating — 3,749 ratings 
45. 
Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body's Most Underrated Organ
by:
Giulia Enders
4.08 avg rating — 53,723 ratings 
49. 
A Life on Our Planet: My Witness Statement and a Vision for the Future 4.50 avg rating — 33,112 ratings
50. 
The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence
by:
Carl Sagan
4.19 avg rating — 21,190 ratings 52. 
Our Inner Ape: A Leading Primatologist Explains Why We Are Who We Are
by:
Frans de Waal
4.19 avg rating — 4,317 ratings 53. 
Rabid: A Cultural History of the World's Most Diabolical Virus
by:
Bill Wasik
3.72 avg rating — 11,395 ratings 54. 
The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design
by:
Richard Dawkins
4.09 avg rating — 41,145 ratings 55. 
Who We Are and How We Got Here: Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past
by:
David Reich
4.14 avg rating — 5,853 ratings 56. 
The Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction
by:
David Quammen
4.29 avg rating — 8,561 ratings 
58. 
Your Inner Fish: a Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body
by:
Neil Shubin
4.04 avg rating — 28,100 ratings 59. 
Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters
by:
Matt Ridley
4.06 avg rating — 27,647 ratings 59. 
Through a Window: My Thirty Years with the Chimpanzees of Gombe
by:
Jane Goodall
4.29 avg rating — 3,223 ratings 61. 
The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt's New World
by:
Andrea Wulf
4.32 avg rating — 28,488 ratings 62. 
The Dragon Behind the Glass: A True Story of Power, Obsession, and the World's Most Coveted Fish
by:
Emily Voigt
3.92 avg rating — 2,080 ratings 63. 
Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo
by:
Sean B. Carroll
4.08 avg rating — 5,698 ratings 
69. 
The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature
by:
Matt Ridley
4.05 avg rating — 17,202 ratings 69. 
What Is Life? with Mind and Matter and Autobiographical Sketches 4.13 avg rating — 7,501 ratings
71. 
I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
by:
Ed Yong
4.18 avg rating — 30,338 ratings 
73. 
The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales
by:
Oliver Sacks
4.05 avg rating — 239,828 ratings 73. 
Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?
by:
Frans de Waal
3.97 avg rating — 16,190 ratings 
78. 
81. 
The American Plague: The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, the Epidemic that Shaped Our History 3.91 avg rating — 6,647 ratings
82. 
Get Well Soon: History's Worst Plagues and the Heroes Who Fought Them
by:
Jennifer Wright
4.23 avg rating — 13,612 ratings 
85. 
A Primate's Memoir: A Neuroscientist's Unconventional Life Among the Baboons 4.39 avg rating — 8,662 ratings
87. 
Alex & Me: How a Scientist and a Parrot Discovered a Hidden World of Animal Intelligence—and Formed a Deep Bond in the Process 4.10 avg rating — 10,017 ratings
89. 
The Origins of Virtue: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation
by:
Matt Ridley
4.03 avg rating — 4,184 ratings 
93. 
Wicked Bugs: The Louse That Conquered Napoleon's Army and Other Diabolical Insects
by:
Amy Stewart
3.76 avg rating — 5,185 ratings 94. 
The Sports Gene: Inside the Science of Extraordinary Athletic Performance
by:
David Epstein
4.20 avg rating — 16,556 ratings 
97. 
Feral: Rewilding the Land, the Sea and Human Life
by:
George Monbiot
4.16 avg rating — 5,312 ratings 98. 
Wicked Plants: The Weed That Killed Lincoln's Mother and Other Botanical Atrocities
by:
Amy Stewart
3.82 avg rating — 10,912 ratings 
