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Nature and Science June 2024
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| Total garbage: how we can fix our waste and heal our world by Edward HumesWhat it is: This story-driven and in-depth exploration of the pervasive yet hard-to-see wastefulness that permeates our daily lives illuminates the ways in which we've been duped into accepting absolutely insane levels of waste as normal. "Total Garbage" also tells the story of individuals and communities who are finding the way back from waste, and showing us that our choices truly matter and make a difference.
Try these next: Tatiana Schlossberg's "Inconspicuous Consumption," Oliver Franklin-Wallis' "Wasteland" and Tara McKenna's "Don't Be Trashy."
First line of the book: "You swallowed 285 pieces of plastic today." - Edward Humes |
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The weight of nature: how a changing climate changes our brainsby Clayton Page AldernWhat's inside: How we feel about climate change matters deeply; but this is a book about much more than climate anxiety. As Aldern richly details, it is about the profound, direct action of global warming on our brains and behavior—and the most startling portrait yet of unforeseen environmental influences on our minds.
Further reading: "The Parrot and the Igloo" by David Lipsky, "Not the End of the World" by Hannah Ritchie, and "The Heat Will Kill You First" by Jeff Goodell.
What reviews say: "Aldern is the rare writer who dares to ask how climate change has already changed us." - New York Times Book Review
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| Alien Earths: the new science of planet hunting in the cosmos by Lisa KalteneggerWhat it is: Astrophysicist Lisa Kaltenegger describes the search for exoplanets that could support extraterrestrial life. In "Alien Earths," she demonstrates how we can use our homeworld as a Rosetta Stone, creatively analyzing Earth's history and its astonishing biosphere to inform this search.
You might also like: Adam Frank's "The Little Book of Aliens," Moiya McTier's "The Milky Way" and Michael Summers' "Exoplanets."
About the author: Lisa Kaltenegger is the Director of the Carl Sagan Institute to Search for Life in the Cosmos at Cornell and Associate Professor in Astronomy. She is a pioneer and world-leading expert in modeling potential habitable worlds and their detectable spectral fingerprint. |
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Every living thing: the great and deadly race to know all lifeby Jason RobertsWhat's inside: Jason Roberts weaves a sweeping, unforgettable narrative spell, exploring the intertwined lives and legacies of Linnaeus and Buffon—as well as the groundbreaking, often fatal adventures of their acolytes—to trace an arc of insight and discovery that extends across three centuries into the present day.
Similar books: Andrea Wulf's "The Invention of Nature," Rebecca Stott's "Darwin's Ghost" and "A Brief History of Creation" by Bill Mesler and H. James Cleaves.
What reviews say: “A lively, panoramic contribution to the history of science.”- Kirkus Reviews
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| Wild life: finding my purpose in an untamed world by Dr. Rae Wynn-GrantWhat it is: In this engaging memoir, wildlife ecologist Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant recounts her career journey and reflects on her experiences as a Black woman scientist in a field dominated by white men.
You might also like: Cassandra Leah Quave's "The Plant Hunter," Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka's "Walking With Gorillas" and Chanda Prescod-Weinstein's "The Disordered Cosmos."
About the author: Dr. Wynn-Grant is an ecologist, storyteller, and science communicator. She studies large carnivores with a focus on using statistical modeling to determine how human activity alters the spatial patterns of carnivore behavior and ecology. |
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Authors you might also like: Bill Bryson, Neil deGrasse Tyson and Siddhartha Mukherjee. Quote from the book: "...all matter - everything around and within us - has an ultimate birthday: the day the universe was born." - Dan Levitt
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From one cell: a journey into life's origins and the future of medicine by Ben StangerWhat it is: In "From One Cell," physician and researcher Ben Stanger offers a breathtaking glimpse into what scientists are discovering about how life and the body take shape, and how these revelations stand to revolutionize medicine and the future of human health.
Similar publications: "Immune" by Philipp Dettmer, "Genome" by Matt Ridley and "She Has Her Mother's Laugh" by Carl Zimmer.
Fact from the book: "The word "cell" was coined in 1665 by the English naturalist Robert Hooke when he noticed that cork, when placed under a powerful magnifying glass, was divided into subunits that resembled cells of a honeycomb, or monks' cells in a monastery." - Ben Stanger
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Dark and magical places: the neuroscience of navigationby Christopher KempWhat's inside: A book for anyone who has ever felt compelled to venture off the beaten path, "Dark and Magical Places" is a stirring reminder of the beauty in losing yourself to your surroundings, and the beauty in understanding how our brains can guide us home.
Further reading: Sara Peskin's "A Molecule Away From Madness," David Eagleman's "Incognito" and Rebecca Schwarzlose's "Brainscapes."
What reviews say: "Finding our way is a basic necessity of life, yet it is mostly taken for granted. Kemp effectively explains just how complex and astonishing that task really is." - Tony Miksanek, Booklist
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We are electric: inside the 200-year hunt for our body's bioelectric code, and what the future holds by Sally AdeeWhat it's about: Journalist Sally Adee takes us through the thrilling history of bioelectricity—the electric currents that run through our bodies and every living thing—to show how the next scientific frontier might be decrypting the bioelectric code, much the way we did the genetic code.
You might also like: "The Elephant in the Universe" by Govert Schilling, "The Gene" by Siddhartha Mukherjee and "I Contain Multitudes" by Ed Yong.
About the author: Sally Adee is an independent science and technology journalist based in London, whose work has appeared in New Scientist, The New York Times, BBC Future, IEEE Spectrum and The Economist.
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The master builder: how the new science of the cell is rewriting the story of lifeby Alfonso Martinez AriasWhat it is: A sweeping revision of both the present and the history of life, "The Master Builder" puts forward a new paradigm for understanding biology, transforming our approach to where we come from, what shapes us and where we are going - as individuals, a species and the community of life itself.
What to read next: Matt Ridley's "Genome," Paul Nurse's "What is Life?" and Yuval N. Harari's "Sapiens."
Did you know?: A person that carries two genomes inside them is a chimera? This can happen when two eggs are fertilized and then join to create one human.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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Forsyth County Public Library 660 W. Fifth St., Winston-Salem, NC 27101 336-703-2665forsythlibrary.org |
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