The latest Science Shelf newsletter is now available online.
You may also want to look over the new additions to the Books Received page.
Highlights include comments and links to more information about the following titles:
• A Left-Hand Turn Around the World: Chasing the Mystery and Meaning of All Things Southpaw by David Wolman
• The Republican War on Science by Chris Mooney (another lefty, some would say)
• Our Inner Ape: A Leading Primatologist Explains Why We Are Who We Are by Frans de Waal (review includes an opening limerick and a quotation from the book about bonobos and the Kama Sutra)
• Beating Back the Devil: On the Front Lines with the Disease Detectives of the Epidemic Intelligence Service by Maryn McKenna (not a new book, but worth another look)
• Out of Gas by David Goodstein and The End of Oil by Paul Roberts, two prescient 2004 books that are now available in paperback. Notably, the paperback edition of The End of Oil has an afterword that is anything but comforting. The current spike in gasoline prices due to the destructive effects of Hurricane Katrina may be a preview of frequent conditions in the volatile oil market to come.
• The Planets by Dava Sobel
• In the “tooting my own horn” department, Beyond Jupiter: The Story of Planetary Astronomer Heidi Hammel by Fred Bortz, part of the “Women’s Adventures in Science” series for middle-grade readers.