Award-winning science author Anthony D. Fredericks has signed a contract with Ruka Press® to publish his new work, Horseshoe Crab: A Biography of the Creature Older than Time. Fredericks is currently writing the book, with publication tentatively planned for Spring 2012.

Fredericks has written nearly 400 magazine and journal articles and 119 books, including three college textbooks, 75 education books, and several adult trade books, such as the recent How Long Things Live: And How They Live as Long as They Do (Stackpole Books) and Walking with Dinosaurs: Rediscovering Colorado’s Prehistoric Beasts (Johnson Books). Moreover, he is the author of more than 35 children’s books in a variety of genres, primarily environmental science and natural history, and he co-authored with Isaac Asimov the best-selling Science Fair Handbook, 3rd Ed. (Good Year, 2005). Several of his children’s books have won awards; Around One Cactus: Owls, Bats, and Leaping Rats (Dawn) won a 2004 Teacher’s Choice Award. He has been a professional educator for nearly 40 years.

Horseshoe Crab: A Biography of the Creature Older than Time is the first adult trade book to deal exclusively with this relic of the past that is not really a crab, but a throwback to an era long since vanished. Horseshoe Crab will feature compelling insights, captivating biology, wry observations and up-to-the-minute natural history that will keep readers engaged and enthralled. The book will include humor, the latest research, fascinating individuals (scientists and lay people alike), and the awe of a fellow explorer as he guides readers on a journey of wonder.

Horseshoe crabs are prehistoric creatures that have survived for millennia but are still little understood; their blood is a medical miracle, and their traditional habitat, the Delaware Bay, is environmentally troubled. Similar to Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World by Mark Kurlansky and The Whale: In Search of the Giants of the Sea by Philip Hoare, this is a guidebook for armchair marine biologists everywhere who seek amazing discoveries in concert with compelling narration.

We’re thrilled to be publishing this compelling book. Together with our first book, Among the Ancients: Adventures in the Eastern Old-Growth Forests, we’re starting to build a strong list of fascinating, environmentally oriented titles that we can’t wait to share with the public.

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