Nowhere on our planet is devoid of life. Plants, animals and man thrive or survive within the extremes of climate and almost infinite variety of domicile which it offers. Single species and often whole communities, adapt to make the most of ice-cap and tundra, forest and plain, desert, ocean and volcano. The adaptations are sometimes extraorfinary: fish which walk or lay eggs on leaves in mid air; snakes that fly; flightless birds that graze like deer; and bears which grow hair on the soles of their feet.

In The Living Planet, based on his BBC television series, David Attenbourough's searching eye, unfailing curiousty and infectious enthusiasm, explain and illuminate the intricate lives of these colonies - from the lonely heights of the Himalayas to the wild creatures which have established themselves in the most recent of environments, the city. By the end of this biook it is difficult to say which is the more astonishing - the ingenuity with which individual species contrive a living of the complexity of their interdependence on each other and the habitations provided by our plant.

As in the author's previous book, Life on Earth, which unfolded the story of evolution, a profusion of superb photographs illustrates the principal facets of the earth's surface and their inhabitants.