Steve N. G. Howell

A beautiful book. Excellently photos and illustrations. Great tips on bird field marks as well as differentiating one species from another. Each bird gets a whole page of pictures and info; large pages of approximately 11"x6".
Helpfully organized by (most common) habitat: Urban Areas, Woodlands, Grasslands, Wetlands, Seashores, and Deserts.
The Family Groups section could use an overhaul (more easy to read layout, more photographs), but other than that, it's an excellent addition for your home birding library.… (meer)

This is a good guide written by four experts in the birding world. My favorite part of the book is called Understanding Birds and covers topics like birds both real and imaginary, the origins of birds, life cycles, etc. The last half of the book is an identification guide and the photography is beautiful. This part of the guide is organized by type of habitat: deserts, urban areas, grasslands, etc.

Too big to be a field guide but full of useful information, especially to anyone new to the hobby of birding, this guide is enjoyable arm chair reading.… (meer)