Thor Hanson, author of “Feathers” and “The Triumph of Seeds,” will visit Eagle Harbor Book Company at 6:30 p.m. Friday, July 13 to discuss his new book “Buzz: The Nature and Necessity of Bees,” a fascinating historical, cultural, and biological look at the buzzing wee beasties that make the world go round.

The book has been called a “ must-read for anyone who loves honey, pollination, or the planet’s most successful vegetarian insect … it is an important book at a time when questions about insect crashes are in the news.”

Hanson writes that bees are like oxygen: ubiquitous, essential, and, for the most part, unseen.

While we might overlook them, they lie at the heart of relationships that bind the human and natural worlds. In “Buzz,” Hanson takes readers on a journey that begins 125 million years ago, when a wasp first dared to feed pollen to its young. From honeybees and bumbles to lesser-known diggers, miners, leafcutters and masons, bees have long been central to our harvests, our mythologies, and our very existence. They’ve given us sweetness and light, the beauty of flowers, and as much as a third of the foodstuffs we eat.

And, alarmingly, they are at risk of disappearing.