Natalie Angier

NOW REVISED AND UPDATED. 'A glorious, fascinating encyclopaedic look at the wonder of the female body.' WOMAN'S JOURNAL

A revised and updated anniversary edition of Natalie Angier's bestselling guide to--and celebration of--the female body National Book Award finalist A New York Times notable book "A tour de force, a wonderful, entertaining and informative book." --The New York Times Book Review Woman is a fascinating, fact-filled guide that covers everything from organs to orgasms, hormones to hysterectomies. With her characteristic clarity, insight, and sheer exuberance of language, bestselling author Natalie Angier cuts through the still-prevalent myths and misinformation surrounding the female body, that most enigmatic of evolutionary masterpieces. With a witty and assured narrative, and a reader-friendly dose of science, Woman is an essential and engaging resource for all time.

Confucius called them the "king of fragrant plants," and John Ruskin condemned them as "prurient apparitions." Across the centuries, orchids have captivated us with their elaborate exoticism, their powerful perfumes, and their sublime seductiveness. But the disquieting beauty of orchids is an unplanned marvel of evolution, and the story of orchids is as captivating as any novel. As acclaimed writer Michael Pollan and National Geographic photographer Christian Ziegler spin tales of orchid conquest in "Deceptive Beauties: The World of Wild Orchids", we learn how these flowers forests to the Arctic, from semi deserts to rocky mountainsides; how their shapes, colors, and scents are, as Darwin put it, "beautiful contrivances" meant to dupe pollinating male insects in the strangest ways. What other flowers, after all, can mimic the pheromones and even appearance of female insects, so much so that some male bees prefer sex with the orchids over sex with their own kind? And insects aren't the only ones to fall for the orchids' charms. Since the "orchidelirium" of the Victorian era, humans have braved the wilds to search them out and devoted copious amounts of time and money propagating and hybridizing, nurturing and simply gazing at them. This astonishing book features over 150 unprecedented color photographs taken by Christian Ziegler himself as he trekked through wilderness on five continents to capture the diversity and magnificence of orchids in their natural habitats. His intimate and astonishing images allow us to appreciate up close nature's most intoxicating and deceptive beauties.

The latest anthology of the finest science writing to be published in 2001 is edited by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author and features an ecclectic array of works by notable authors--including Malcolm Gladwell, Joy Williams, Barbara Ehrenreich, an Dennis Overbye--on everything from the latest advances in medical research to the wonders of the natural world. Simultaneous. 35,000 first printing.

As dramatic as The Double Hex and as absorbing as The Soul of a New Machine, Natural Obsessions explores the advanced reaches of molecular biology, the nature of the human cell, and the genes that control cancer. It unforgettably portrays some of the best young scientists in the world, the rewards and discouragements of scientific research, and the very process of scientific inquiry.