Free Nature Books by Alice L. Hopf

I love the surprise of picking up an interesting book at a used book sale and discovering a new favorite writer. Many years ago, when I was buying up all the old-fashioned living nature books I could find for $1 or less, I picked up a copy of Biography of an Ant by Alice L. Hopf. 

We started reading it at morning time and everyone was transfixed by this simple and powerful story of an ant's life. Not only was the story exciting, but we all learned so much. And we began to observe the truth of the story in the real world when we took time to notice ants in our backyard. 

This was a living book. The ideas inspired us to notice and wonder. There were so many facts in the books, but they all hung on the ideas so they were delightful and palatable instead of dry and forgettable. 

While searching archive.org for some new living books to use in our nature studies this year, I came across many of Alice Hopf's titles that are available to be borrowed online for an hour and read through a browser or device or even cast to a tv. I've added them to my  Best Free Nature Lore Books List or check them out below. 

Unfortunately, Biography of an Ant is not on this list, nor are many other of her books. But I'll just keep her on my book sale hunting list and she will be another author whose books make my heart skip a beat when I finally find one!

Alice L. Hopf

All of the following titles can be borrowed online for 1 hour from the Internet Archive.

• Animal and Plant Life Spans
• Animals That Eat Nectar and Honey
• Bats
• Biography of a Giraffe
• Biography of an Octopus
• Biography of a Rhino
• Biography of a Snowy Owl
• Carab the Trap-Door Spider
• Chickens and Their Wild Relatives
• Hyenas
• Misplaced Animals and Other Living Creatures
• Misunderstood Animals
• Nature's Pretenders
• Pigs Wild and Tame
• Spiders
• Strange Sex Lives in the Animal Kingdom
• Whose House Is It?
• Wild Cousins of the Dog
• Wild Cousins of the Cat

If you haven't visited my Best Free Nature Lore Books List, it is a great place to find wonderful nature lore books to download from Google or the Internet Archive or borrow from the Internet Archive for one hour at a time. If you don't like reading on a device, some can be found inexpensively used and a few are starting to come back into print!