Annie Leonard, "The Story of Stuff"

By erika on 7/22/10 3:59pm
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If you watched the free 20 minute online "Story of Stuff" documentary and thought "That's great, but I wish it was drier, and more packed with an overwhelming volume of information," then this book is for you!  I hate to sound catty, but it's true.   Sadly, this book takes everything that made the documentary great, and does the exact opposite.

Charitably, The Story of Stuff (the book) could be said to be a companion piece to the documentary.  A tome for those who watched the movie and wanted to dispute the facts.  A dense brick of text, thick with footnotes, heavy on policy wonkery and clunky writing.

The genius of the "Story of Stuff" documentary is that it was told in plain English, without a lot of judgment - just the facts.  It was illustrated with an animated style of ink brush figures that are both charming and clean, giving a lot of white space to the screen, which lets you focus on what's being said.  


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Mary Roach, "Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife"

By erika on 6/26/10 5:22pm
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Mary Roach's first book, "Stiff," is one of my favorite non-fiction books of all time.  It has earned a permanent spot on my bookshelves, and if you know what a fanatic I am about decluttering and "culling the herd" and selling old books to buy new ones, you would realize what a place of honor that is!  I have to admit that I didn't enjoy "Spook" quite as much as I enjoyed "Stiff," but it was still a great read.  

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The Kids’ Science Book

By sarajean on 4/16/10 9:53am
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Kids Can! Books are wonderful introductions to various subjects. The Kids’ Science Book: Creative Experiences for Hands-on Fun is no exception. Intended for children ages 4 to 10, the book contains over 100 simple yet exciting science experiments to help get children—as well as adults—interested in science.

Authors Nancy White and Robert Hirschfeld include experiments sure to please any young scientists. Some of these include making a magic watering can, homemade ice cream, and growing a garden. Complex concepts, such as photosynthesis, momentum, and pressure are all tactilely explained through experiments with marbles, plants, and other common household objects.

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Roadside Geology of Washington

By becksta on 3/4/10 12:36am
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Roadside Geology of WashingtonRoadside Geology of WashingtonI was in my friend’s pick-up several years ago when I noticed a colorful book on the dashboard, picked it up, and actually found it one of the more interesting travel books I have ever read. “Roadside Geology of Washington” is a great way to understand the geological history of the roadsides of Washington state. This book is no “ Another Roadside Attraction” and instead contains detailed geological history lessons, maps, and old photographs of the different areas. Although the book is part of a series of books about the geology of the states, this is the only one I've had the chance to peruse.


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The Everything Kids' Science Experiments Book

By sarajean on 2/27/10 3:55pm
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A new book resides at the top of my wish list—both for myself as well as my daughter: The Everything Kids’ Science Experiment Book: Boil Ice, Float Water, Measure Gravity—Challenge the World Around You! I know the instant we get our hands on this book, we’re going to turn the house topsy-turvy with experiments galore.

Some of the experiments you can find in the book include blowing up balloons without actually blowing into them, “turning off” magnets, finding what exists inside coins, learning about toilet flushing, and more. The book, written by science teacher Tom Robinson, has the fields of chemistry, biology, physics, and other scientific realms covered in dozens of experiments. I cannot wait to find out how an entire swimming pool can be cleaned with the breath of a single person…

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Jared Diamond, "Guns, Germs and Steel"

By erika on 1/25/10 6:17pm
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Jared Diamond's book won the Pulitzer Prize, among many others, and has even been made into a PBS documentary.  Diamond managed to tackle a thorny issue head on, with a remarkable tact.  At the same time, it's a chicken and egg sort of debate, and it all comes down to "why we won," whereas a lot of people question that we really did win.

Guns, Germs and Steel refutes any racial theories of why Western civilization thrived and took over the globe, whereas cultures from continents like Africa and the Americas didn't fare so well in the cultural arms race of the last 13,000 years.  Although I found long passages of the book to be extremely dry (I admit, I did some skimming) overall Diamond's writing and premise are gripping and informative.


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Security

By akgoemans on 1/19/10 10:09am
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SecuritySecurity

The trouble with science fiction novels about dystopian worlds is their overall message that this type of end is inescapable. Admittedly, a lot of books have a more cheerful end-note whereby a group of people will set the stage for a new way of life. Having said that, I also noticed that while those are great reads in their own right, the truly good books are ones that tackle this topic with the view that dystopia, in one form or another, is unavoidable. Poul Anderson's Security falls into this category.


In this short story, the author describes a bleak world where a nanny state pretends to be a democratic one, where the government watches over every move of its citizens.

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Full House, by Stephen Jay Gould

By ecoscott on 12/28/09 10:54pm
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Stephen Jay GouldStephen Jay GouldThis book is for science nuts who like to have things explained in layman’s terms by an expert who is completely in love with the stories he is telling. I love these kinds of books- the ones where the author is basically writing part mental memoir, part educational text, and part new contribution to scientific knowledge.

Gould’s book is obviously a labor of love for him. It is a series of short chapters, each of which looks at parts of evolution in a new way and explains to you some kind of truth that you either thought you knew or had no idea existed.

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Stephen Jay Gould, "The Mismeasure of Man"

By erika on 12/26/09 12:57pm
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Harvard paleontologist, author, and evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould was one of the modern world's truly great minds.  Gould stands in the same league as scientists like Carl Sagan, who also brought science to the rest of us.

One of Gould's greatest books has to be The Mismeasure of Man, which should also be required reading for every American.  Heck, for every human being on this planet.  Originally published in 1981, The Mismeasure of Man continues to be relevant today, and sadly enough will probably never pass into irrelevancy.


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Diane Ackerman, "A Natural History of the Senses"

By erika on 12/3/09 6:29pm
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This is one of my favorite works of science writing, and I have real difficulty believing that it was first published in 1991.  Can it really have been 18 years?  When did I get old like that?

At any rate, Diane Ackerman has written many books since, but I still feel that A Natural History of the Senses remains her best.  Ackerman breaks her book down by sense (I'm sure you will not be surprised to learn) and then riffs on each sense in a manner which is engrossing, entertaining, and sometimes just gross.

A Natural History of the Senses is structured as a series of short essays, on topics as diverse as the etymological connection between most languages' words for "prostitute" and their words for "rotting smell," and a "sound poem" she once wrote to describe the song of humpback whales.


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