Primate Adaptation and Evolution

I'm not even a student & haven't been for decades, but I sat down to read this text and really didn't want to put it down! My family had to make their own dinners the night it appeared on the front step. It covers everything, just everything you always wanted to know about any primate on the planet: how we are all constructed and why. Most of the illustrations are line-drawings in my edition, but there are lots and lots of them. You cannot go wrong with this book.

Anyone who teaches an intro to primates course will wish to assign this book to their students. There are a variety of textbooks on the subject available, and some of them are excellent. Fleagle's volume, however, is the only one that provides such a complete review of the fossil record and anatomical variation, as well as behavioral variation. It is concise, thorough, and complete, and the best of the choices available to an instructor in this subject.

Can you study physical anthropology and not have this book? Probably not. If it hasn't been assigned to you as part of your education and you are serious about physical anthropology, you should buy this book right now. This book outlines the living primates as well as the extinct species in an easy to understand, easy to learn format. It has all the information you could ever need to know about living and extinct primates.

During college, I used this book extensively to gather initial information on primates. This book covers anywhere from the evolutionary relationship of primates, to the current dentition of any primate species. The book does an excellent job of cataloging primate species to be easily referenced.