Review: Much of the work reviewed here deals with the study of ecology. It's a different tack to ask what you can do armed with such knowledge!

This slim text aims to look at the way in which one can proceed through further study to a job in conservation. Although this is quite a focussed field there is no reason to suggest that the ways of going about it would differ significantly in other areas of ecology. We start with an overview that seeks to get the reader to consider they type of career they might want. Conservation is a burgeoning field but it might not be the right one - check out the positives and negatives. Having decided on the career path the next stage is to find the study route that would maximise your chances. Here the book takes a US stance (they're US authors after all!) but the notions - select a solid undergraduate programme and choose your study units carefully - as set out in chapters two and three would resonate anywhere in academia (location or subject!). What they're really saying here is that some initial study will help later study. Chapter four gives ideas about getting onto the course of your choice. This might differ but, again, the basic advice - research and gain contact to maximise your success - is solid. Chapter five might seem like more of a post-graduate theme with an emphasis on choosing study routes. However, tie this is with chapter six and seven and you have the makings of good advice on undergraduate dissertations (or post-grad ones for that matter). Careful research, planning and contacts make all the difference (as does a supervisor with whom one can feel comfortable). Chapters 8 and 9 cover the next stage which is increasingly (sadly?) important - get your name known. This would involve attending conferences and getting your work published. The final two chapters look at getting a job and questioning why you are doing it. The former is a useful guide to the resources one needs to secure the post. The latter is hoping to get the reader to think seriously about why they want the post in the first place (perhaps this should be the other way around!). Conservation work require certain characteristics from its practitioners and it saves a good deal of heartache and problems all round to make sure it really is what you are looking for.

It's good to see a book produced by those actually making a living in the field. Advice is sound and the suggestions reduce the likelihood of arriving at one's first week of employment realising you should be somewhere else. Good reading for secondary or undergraduate and a healthy does of reality which does no-one any harm.