An astronomer explores the science of astrobiology in this " serious but accessible examination of the prospects for finding life elsewhere in the universe" (Sean Carroll, author of The Big Picture ).Describing the most recent discoveries made with space exploration technology, including the Kepler space telescope, the Mars Curiosity rover, and the New Horizons probe, astronomer Jon Willi...

"Here is Willis's fundamental argument: The more we learn about Earth—our one 'pale blue data point' for a planet on which life has definitively arisen—the more qualified we will be to recognize signs of life elsewhere. . . . [A] joyful account."—Steven Poole, The Wall Street JournalA thrilling tour of Earth that shows the search for extraterrestrial life starts in our own backyard.Is there life off Earth? Bound by...

Long before space travel was possible, the idea of life beyond Earth transfixed humans. In this fascinating book, astronomer Jon Willis explores the science of astrobiology and the possibility of locating other life in our own galaxy.Describing the most recent discoveries by space exploration missions, including the Kepler space telescope, the Mars Curiosity rover, and the New Horizons probe, Willis asks listeners to imagine—and choose among—five scenarios for fin...

"The Russia that Satter depicts in this brave, engaging book cannot be ignored . . . Required reading for anyone interested in the post-Soviet state" (Newsweek).Anticipating a new dawn of freedom after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Russians could hardly have foreseen the reality of their future a decade later: a country impoverished and controlled at every level by organized crime. This riveting book views the 1990s reform period through the expe...

Part detective story, part personal quest, Michael Good's book is the story of the German commander of a Lithuanian work camp who saved hundreds of Jewish lives in the Vilnius ghetto—including the life of Good's mother, Pearl. Who was this enigmatic officer Pearl Good had spoken of so often?After five years of research—interviewing survivors, assembling a team that could work to open German files untouched for fifty years, following every lead he could, Good was able to uncover the...

Whose Middle Ages? is an interdisciplinary collection of short, accessible essays intended for the nonspecialist reader and ideal for teaching at an undergraduate level. Each of twenty-two essays takes up an area where digging for meaning in the medieval past has brought something distorted back into the present: in our popular entertainment; in our news, our politics, and our propaganda; and in subtler ways that inform how we think about our histories, our countries, and ourselves. Each a...

A group biography of the relationship between FDR and four of his Supreme Court justices, written by legal scholar Noah Feldman.A tiny, ebullient Jew who started as America's leading liberal and ended as its most famous judicial conservative. A Klansman who became an absolutist advocate of free speech and civil rights. A backcountry lawyer who started off trying cases about cows and went on to conduct the most important international trial ever. A self-invented, ta...

Brilliant, reminiscent of Lewis Hyde's The Gift in its reach and of Timothy Egan's The Worst Hard Time in its haunting evocation of human lives, offers a sweeping view of a surprisingly revealing aspect of human history—from the stone lamps of the Pleistocene to the LEDs embedded in fabrics of the future.Brox plumbs the class implications of light—who had it, who didn't—through the many centuries when crude lamps and tallow candles constricted waking hour...

In this intriguing book, evolutionary biologist Scott Solomon draws on the explosion of discoveries in recent years to examine the future evolution of our species. Combining knowledge of our past with current trends, Solomon offers convincing evidence that evolutionary forces still affect us today. But how will modernization—including longer lifespans, changing diets, global travel, and widespread use of medicine and contraceptives—affect our evolutionary future?Solomon presents an...

An eye-opening celebration of the marvels of space, time, the cosmos, and moreHow to Love the Universe is a new kind of science writing by an author truly enamored of the world around him. In ten short chapters of lyrical prose—each one an ode to a breathtaking realm of discovery—Stefan Klein uses everyday objects and events as a springboard to meditate on the beauty of the underlying science.Klein sees in a single rose the sublime interdependence ...

On fire for God—a sweeping history of puritanism in England and America.Begun in the mid–sixteenth century by Protestant nonconformists keen to reform England's church and society while saving their own souls, the puritan movement was a major catalyst in the great cultural changes that transformed the early modern world. Providing a uniquely broad transatlantic perspective, this groundbreaking volume traces puritanism's tumultuous history from its initial attempts ...

An account of the dramatic turning point in World War II that marked "the dawn of American might and the struggle for supremacy in Southeast Asia" (Times Higher Education).In far-flung locations around the globe, an unparalleled sequence of international events took place between December 1 and December 12, 1941. In this riveting book, historian Evan Mawdsley explores how the story unfolded . . .On Monday, December 1, 1941, the Japanese government ...