Allaby, A. and M. Allaby. (Editors). 1999. Dictionary of Earth Sciences. 2nd Edition. Oxford University press, London. (Excellent dictionary of more than 6,000 earth science terms many of which are used in physical geography - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Archibold, O.W. 1994. Ecology of World Vegetation. Chapman and Hall, New York. (Excellent university-level textbook broadly covering the ecology of our planet's flora - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Barbour, Michael G., J.H. Burk, W. D. Pitts, F.S. Gilliam, and M.W. Schwartz . 1999. Terrestrial Plant Ecology. 3rd Edition. Pearson Benjamin Cummings. (Excellent university-level textbook broadly covering ecology - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Barbour, Michael G. and W.D. Billings (Editors). 2000. North American Terrestrial Vegetation. 2nd Edition. Cambridge University Press. (Excellent university-level textbook describing the plant communities of North Ameria - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Begon, M., J.L. Harper, and C.R. Townsend. 2000. Ecology: Individuals, Populations and Communities. 3rd Edition. Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, Mass. (Excellent university-level textbook broadly covering ecology - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Brown, J.H. and M.V. Lomolino. 1999. Biogeography. 2nd Edition. Sinauer Associates, Inc. (Excellent university-level textbook dealing with biogeography - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Campbell, Neil A. and Jane B. Reece. 2002. Biology. 6th Edition. Pearson Higher Education. (Excellent university-level textbook dealing with introductory biology - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Christopherson, R. W. 2005. Geosystems: An Introduction to Physical Geography. 5th Edition. Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey. (Excellent university-level textbook that focuses broadly on physical geography. Contains a few chapters that describe how the Earth's biosphere functions - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Cohen, P. 1996. Let there be life. New Scientist 151(2037): 22-27.

Cox, C.P. and P.D. Moore. 2001. Biogeography: An Ecological and Evolutionary Approach. 6th Edition. Blackwell, London. (Excellent university-level textbook dealing with biogeography - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Delsemme, A.H. 2001. An argument for the cometary origin of the biosphere. American Scientist 89:432-442.

Field, C.B. and M. R. Raupach (Editors). 2004. The Global Carbon Cycle: Integrating Humans, Climate, and the Natural World. Island Press. (Excellent textbook that examines the carbon cycle in detail - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Fortey, R. 1999. Life : A Natural History of the First Four Billion Years of Life on Earth. Knopf Publishing. (Popular non-expert book that examines the evolution of life through their fossils - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Gibbs, W.W. 2001. On the termination of species. Scientific American Nov.: 39-49.

Gould, S.J. 1994. The evolution of life on the Earth. Scientific American Oct.: 84-91.

Hazen, R. M. 2001. Lifes rocky start. Scientific American Apr.: 76-85.

Huggett, R.J. 1999. Fundamentals of Biogeography. Routledge Publishing. (Excellent university-level textbook dealing with biogeography - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Knoll , Andrew H. 2003. Life on a Young Planet: The First Three Billion Years of Evolution on Earth. Princeton University Press. (University-level text book that examines the evolution of life - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Krebs, C.J. 2001. Ecology: The Experimental Analysis of Distribution and Abundance. 5th Edition. Pearson Addison Wesley. (Excellent university-level textbook broadly covering ecology - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Kring, D.A. and D.D. Durda. 2003. The day the world burned. Scientific American Dec.: 98-105.

MacArthur, R.H. 1984. Geographical Ecology: Patterns in the Distribution of Species. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey.

MacDonald, G. 2002. Space, Time and Life: The Science of Biogeography. John Wiley and Sons, New York. (Excellent university-level textbook covering biogeography - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Mielke, H.W. 1989. Patterns of Life: Biogeography of a Changing World. Unwin Hyman, Boston. (Excellent university-level textbook dealing with biogeography - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Molles, M.C., Jr. 2002. Ecology: Concepts and Applications. 2nd Edition. McGraw-Hill, Dubuque, Iowa.(Excellent university-level ono-technical textbook covering introductory ecology - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Myers, A.A. and P.S. Giller. 1988. Analytical Biogeography: An Integrated Approach to the Study of Animal and Plant Distributions. Chapman and Hall, London.

Odum, E.P. 1993. Ecology and Our Endangered Life-Support Systems. Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, Mass.

Odum, H.T. 1983. Systems Ecology: An Introduction. Wiley, New York.

Orgel, L.E. 1994. The origin of life on the Earth. Scientific American Oct.: 77-83.

Parker, S.P. (Editor). 2003. McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Earth Science. Second Edition. McGraw-Hill, New York. (Excellent dictionary of more than 10,000 earth science terms many of which are used in physical geography - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Pears, N. 1977. Basic Biogeography. Longman, London.

Pennisi, E. and W. Roush. 1997. Developing a new view of evolution. Science 277: 34-37.

Simmons, I.G. 1982. Biogeographical Processes. Allen and Unwin, London.

Strahler, Alan H. and Arthur Strahler. 2003. Physical Geography: Science and Systems of the Human Environment. 2nd Edition John Wiley and Sons, New York. (Excellent university-level textbook that focuses broadly on physical geography. Contains a few chapters that explain the nature of our planet's biosphere - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)

Whitlow, J.B. 2001. The Penguin Dictionary of Physical Geography. Second Edition. Penguin, Harmondsworth. (Must have reference for those wanting to learn physical geography terms - browse/buy from amazon.com or amazon.ca)