"The Animal Connection," a new book by Pat Shipman, a Penn State paleoanthropologist, presents the groundbreaking new idea that humans' connection to other animal species may be the driving force behind the last 2.6 million years of human evolution. Reviewers have hailed the book, calling it "a work of extraordinarily broad scholarship" and saying that "animal lovers and readers who are interested in human psychology will not be able to put this fascinating book down." Shipman elegantly synthesizes decades of paleontology, anthropology, and evolutionary theory through the new lens of the animal connection, creating a compelling view of human development. "Animals were not incidental to our evolution into Homo sapiens; they were essential to it -- they are what made us human."

Married co-authors Alan Walker and Pat Shipman write in their new book The Ape in the Tree that humans are separated by "at least one million generations" from a creature known as Proconsul, which evolved in Africa during the Miocene era between 21 and 14 million years ago. Proconsul was a 20-pound primate that lived in trees and ate fruits. We know it from a wealth of fossils found at several sites, including ones on Rusinga and Mfangano Islands in Lake Victoria, Kenya, where Walker led a series of archaeological expeditions during the 1980s.

I am one of that peculiar breed known as science writers. In fact, I belong to the strangest minority of science writers, for I was a scientist for years before turning to writing. I believe very strongly in what I do: I tell science. Although there are those who feel my writing career is a waste of a good scientific mind, I believe that by telling science I make a real and substantive contribution to both science and writing.