The Book of Snakes: A Life-Size Guide to Six Hundred Species from Around the World Hardcover - 2018

Mark O'Shea MBE is a herpetologist, zoologist, author, lecturer, and television presenter. He is professor of herpetology at the University of Wolverhampton and he previously spent thirty-three years as curator of reptiles at West Midland Safari Park. He has made ten expeditions to Papua New Guinea since 1986 and between 2009 and 2014 was coleader of a team based out of Victor Valley College, California, conducting the first herpetofaunal survey of Timor-Leste. O'Shea has hosted television documentaries focused on reptiles for the Discovery Channel, the BBC, ITV, and Channel 4, including four seasons as host of the Animal Planet/Discovery Channel show O'Shea's Big Adventure. He has participated as herpetologist on numerous tropical expeditions for the Royal Geographical Society, Oxford University, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, University of Melbourne, University of Adelaide, Operation Raleigh, Raleigh Executive, and Discovery Expeditions. He is a fellow of the Explorers' Club of New York, Royal Geographical Society, and Linnean Society of London. O'Shea is the author of nine books, including A Guide to the Snakes of Papua New Guinea, which he is currently completely revising. In 2018 he was honored when an Asian pipesnake was named Cylindrophis osheai. He has coauthored twelve new snake species descriptions, two of which are included in the second edition of The Book of Snakes. In 2020 he was awarded an MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours "for services to higher education, zoology, reptile conservation and snakebite research". He lives in Shropshire, England, twenty miles from the birthplace of Charles Darwin.