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Alexander Teixeira de Mattos, Jean-Henri Fabre: Life of the Spider (2019, Independently Published)

110 pages

English language

Published Jan. 25, 2019 by Independently Published.

ISBN:
978-1-0772-8219-3
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4 stars (1 review)

The Life of the Spider is a volume in Jean-Henri Fabre's "Souvenirs Entomologiques", in which he shares fifty years of careful observation. He re-acquaints us with the most everyday insects, inspiring a new interest, awareness and understanding in the reader. This volume concerns spiders.

2 editions

Review of 'Life of the Spider' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

As someone who has mild arachnophobia, I enjoyed reading this book.

It presents spiders from an objective perspective: they're not scary, they're wild animals (predators, to be more precise; and they're very good at it). Their instincts are geared towards about eating, mating and staying alive. Despite their size, they should be respected and treated with care, as you would any predator.
What I like enormously is that the author proposes and does experiments (fueled by curiosity on spider behaviour). I found them insightful and they stimulated my imagination to ask Google more questions about spiders.

A bit too detailed at certain moments (I skipped some sections), this is definitely a great read if you want to understand this scary insect.