A Kenyan Red Cross personnel and a volunteer console a relative of a victim, at the site of a building collapse in Nairobi, Kenya, Saturday, April 30, 2016. A six-story residential building in a low income area of the Kenyan capital collapsed Friday night under heavy rain and flooding, killing at least seven people and injuring over 100 others, Kenyan officials said. (Photo by Sayyid Abdul Azim/AP Photo)

Women dressed as a rabbit and a fox, who pose for pictures with tourists, walk in central Kiev, Ukraine April 4, 2018. (Photo by Gleb Garanich/Reuters)

Italian actress Zaina Dridi walks the red carpet for “Carol” during the 10th Rome Film Fest at Auditorium Parco Della Musica on October 22, 2015 in Rome, Italy. (Photo by PA Press Association Images)

An animal enthusiast touches a Bearded Dragon displayed for sale as exotic pet at Thailand Reptile and Exotic Expo in Bangkok, Thailand, 02 August 2024. The Thailand Reptile and Exotic Expo is a trade showcase exhibiting hundreds of reptiles and exotic animals from breeders to sell as exotic pets for enthusiasts. (Photo by Rungroj Yongrit/EPA)

Chinese butchers catch a pig to slaughter on January 31, 2005 in Jinzhai County, Anhui Province, China. (Photo by Cancan Chu/GettyImages)

2014 Underwater Photography Photo Contest winners, Wide angle marine life category, 3rd place. (Photo by Valda Fraser/UnderwaterPhotography.com)

While communism, collectivism, worms, dry rot and casual looting failed to destroy the majestic wooden churches of Russia, it may be ordinary neglect that finally does them in. Dwindled now to several hundred remaining examples, these glories of vernacular architecture lie scattered amid the vastness of the world’s largest country. Just over a decade ago, Richard Davies, a British architectural photographer, struck out on a mission to record the fragile and poetic structures. Austerely beautiful and haunting, “Wooden Churches: Traveling in the Russian North” (White Sea Publishing; $132) is the result. Covering thousands of miles, Mr. Davies described how he and the writer Matilda Moreton tracked down the survivors from among the thousands of onion-domed structures built after Prince Vladimir converted to Christianity in 988.

Boeing B-29 (#10) from the 24th Bomb Squadron, 6th Bomb Group after an emergency landing at Iwo Jima on April 24,1945. (Photo by U.S. Air Force)