I read this post from NPR and was excited to find the book title mentioned in the post newly added to our library's collection. The NPR post  makes a very effective visual and starkly political statement about the state of industrial agriculture using the same method as  A World In One Cubic Foot. I was disappointed to learn the book didn't even attempt to make that same point. The book visually displays the flora and fauna that pass through a square cubic foot within a 24 hour period  from five different habitats; a saltwater bay, a freshwater river, a deciduous forest, a coral reef, and South African fynbos. Yeah, I didn't know what fynbos meant either. What the book does not show is what author Craig Childs, NPR science writer, found in an Iowa cornfield, which was basically not much. So, if you're interested in entomology you'll find A World In One Cubic Foot to be a beautiful work of art,

but if you're concerned with the quality of the food you eat, the water you drink it's more important that you think about this in comparison.

Cornstalks Everywhere But Nothing Else, Not Even A Bee