We are living through a crisis of time. More people than ever report feeling chronically short of it, with serious repercussions for our wellbeing. Yet what if the animal kingdom could redeem our vexed relationship with time, and turn our time famine into a time feast?

In this beguiling and mind-expanding journey through time in the natural world, Jackie Higgins shows us what the animal kingdom can teach us about life beyond the clock. Each chapter examines how a distinct species – from the blue whale to the scrub-jay – might experience the elusive flow of time, from milliseconds to millennia. With these emissaries from the animal kingdom as her guides, Higgins explores the elasticity of the present, the relativity of internal and external clocks, the mercurial role of memory, the possibility of time travel, and so much more.

From a chorus of glimmering fireflies in the Great Smoky Mountains to a herd of elephants lumbering through the East African savannah, Higgins brings us face to face with the species and the scientists who are transforming our understanding of the most fundamental dimension of our universe.

Perspective-shifting and consoling, Time Beings is a new manifesto for time, guided by life on Earth, which shows us that it is not some external force controlling us, but ours to reclaim.

© Jackie Higgins 2027 (P) Penguin Audio 2027