It had to happen. Ninety years on from the birth of Penguin Books, we finally have The Penguin Book of Penguins – and it’s such a sure-fire winner, one wonders what took them so long. As Peter Fretwell, a leading Antarctic scientist, notes, penguins have ‘charm, charisma and a star quality’. They could indeed be ‘the world’s most beloved bird’. Not only are penguins cute but they are also scientifically fascinating, with astonishing powers and physical adaptations: emperor penguins, for example, can dive to below 500 metres – depths at which the air pressure would crush a human – and hold their breath for half an hour and more, closing down parts of their body to conserve oxygen. Fretwell clearly loves all things penguin, though he duly notes that large penguin colonies – and most of them are very large indeed – can be relied on to produce a hideous cacophony and an acrid stench that feels as if it could dissolve the skin at the back of your throat. 

His book, which comes with jolly penguin-­themed endpapers by Hans Schmoller and charming drawings by Lisa Fretwell, his wife, is a lively and readable introduction to the penguin world, taking in the birds’ unique features, their behaviour and their interaction with humans. This last has often been to the detriment of the birds, not least in the days when penguins were killed for food and, worse, oil. A machine called a ‘penguin digester’ was employed at one time, fed with whole birds, from which the precious oil was mechanically crushed. 

The Penguin Book of Penguins usefully lists and describes all eighteen species, their range, population, conservation status, diet and behaviour. The book is as likeable and fascinating as its subject, and has plenty of surprising penguin facts: for example, that a king penguin called Sir Nils Olav III was made