Species evolve over time to become perfectly adapted to their environments, right?{::} Well, sometimes.Consider that an elephant will not grow a seventh set of teeth, even though wearing down the sixth will condemn it to starvation; that hosts of the European cuckoo seem unable to tell that the overgrown monster in their nest is not their own chick; and that whales are fully aquatic mammals who, millions of years after first abandoning the land, sti...

A NATURE BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE MAIL ON SUNDAY'Superb... A testament to just how beautiful and wonderful life on Earth is ' Times Literary Supplement'Fascinating' Guardian'Brilliant' Daily MailFrom scorching deserts to frozen seabeds, from the highest peaks of the Himalaya to the hadal depths of the ocea...

Leah Elson draws upon her wildly popular web series, 60 Seconds of Science, in this highly entertaining and visually appealing giftable book of real-world scientific questions and answers.How does DNA work?Does chicken noodle soup actually help with being sick?When cats purr, what is actually making the noise?Does singing to plants really help them grow?Is it possible to clone a woolly mammoth?In the vein of Randall Munroe’s What If? and p...

One of the world's most celebrated cosmologists presents her breakthrough explanation of our origins in the multiverse.'Fascinating' ROGER PENROSE, Nobel laureate'What if our universe is but an infinitesimal fragment of reality? What would this "multiverse" be like? There is no better guide to the bizarre, and sometimes paradoxical, cosmic super-realm than Laura Mersini-Houghton' Paul Davies, author of What's Eating the...

Everyone knows the story of the codebreaker and computer science pioneer Alan Turing.Except …When Dermot Turing is asked about his famous uncle, people want to know more than the bullet points of his life. They want to know everything – was Alan Turing actually a codebreaker? What did he make of artificial intelligence? What is the significance of Alan Turing's trial, his suicide, the Royal Pardon, the £50 note and the film The...

A journey to forty-five unexpected destinations near and far, with quirky histories, beautiful maps, and evocative photography: "First-class armchair travel." — South China Morning PostA New Statesman Best Book of the YearTake an armchair voyage to places both infamous and unknown that have, often by chance or by haphazard means, been destinations of discovery that shaped our world. Set foot on the aptly named Just Enough Room Isla...

"Addresses an important topic for biologists and zoologists about vertebrates' place in the 'grand scheme' . . . genuinely witty and charming . . . magnificent." —Neil J. Gostling, University of SouthamptonOur understanding of vertebrate origins and the backbone of human history evolves with each new fossil find and DNA map. Many species have now had their genomes sequenced, and molecular techniques allow genetic inspection of even non-model organisms. But as longti...

The acclaimed author of Lolita offers unique insight into works by James Joyce, Franz Kafka, Jane Austen, and others—with an introduction by John Updike.In the 1940s, when Vladimir Nabokov first embarked on his academic career in the United States, he brought with him hundreds of original lectures on the authors he most admired. For two decades those lectures served as the basis for Nabokov's teaching, first at Wellesley and then at Cornell, as he introduc...

"This gracefully written history of twentieth-century gravity research" brings to life the discoveries and developments that confirmed the theory of relativity ( Publishers Weekly, starred review).Albert Einstein did nothing of note on May 29, 1919, yet that is when he became immortal. On that day, astronomer Arthur Eddington and his team observed a solar eclipse and found something extraordinary: gravity bends light, just as Einstein predicted. The finding...

An informative look at the military conflicts that most altered the course of history and civilization, from ancient times to the modern world.Rather than celebrating warfare, 50 Battles That Changed the World looks at the clashes the author believes have had the most profound impact on world history. Ranked in order of their relevance to the modern world, these struggles range from the ancient past to the present day and span the globe many times over.

Wallis Simpson is known as the woman who stole the king's heart and rocked the monarchy – but she was not Edward VIII's first or only love. This book is about the women he adored before Wallis dominated his life. There was Rosemary Leveson-Gower, the girl he wanted to marry and who would have been the perfect match for a future king; and the Prince's long-term mistress, Freda Dudley Ward, who exerted a pull almost equal to Wallis over her lover, but abided by the rules of ...

Covering 13.8 billion years in some 100 pages, a concise, wryly intelligent history of everything, from the Big Bang to the advent of human civilization.With wonder, wit, and flair—and in record time and space—geophysicist David Bercovici explains how everything came to be everywhere, from the creation of stars and galaxies to the formation of Earth's atmosphere and oceans, to the origin of life and human civilization. Bercovici marries humor and legitimate scienti...