An examination of what makes us human and unique among all creatures—our brains.No reader curious about our “little grey cells” will want to pass up Harvard neuroscientist John E. Dowling’s brief introduction to the brain. In this up-to-date revision of his 1998 book Creating Mind, Dowling conveys the essence and vitality of the field of neuroscience—examining the progress we’ve made in understanding how brains work, and shedding light on discoveries havin...

Descriptions of basic visual mechanisms and related clinical abnormalities, by a neuroscientist and an ophthalmologist.Over the past fifty years, enormous progress has been made in understanding visual mechanisms and treating eye disorders. And yet the scientist is not always aware of the latest clinical advances and the clinician is often not up to date on the basic scientific discoveries. Writing in nontechnical language, John and Joseph Dowling, a neuroscientist...

John Dowling’s The Retina, published in 1987, quickly became the most widely recognized introduction to the structure and function of retinal cells. In this Revised Edition, Dowling draws on twenty-five years of new research to produce an interdisciplinary synthesis focused on how retinal function contributes to our understanding of brain mechanisms.The retina is a part of the brain pushed out into the eye during development. It retains many characteristics of other brain ...

This superbly told story brings to life one of the most remarkable rulers––and men––in all of history and conveys the drama of his life and world. The Russia of Peter’s birth was very different from the Russia his energy, genius, and ruthlessness shaped. Crowned co-Tsar as a child of ten, after witnessing bloody uprisings in the streets of Moscow, he would grow up propelled by an unquenchable curiosity, everywhere looking, asking, tinkering, and learning, fired by Western ideas. We see Pet...

Whether our personality, intelligence, and behavior are more likely to be shaped by our environment or our genetic coding is not simply an idle question for today's researchers. There are tremendous consequences to understanding the crucial role that environment and genes each play. How we raise and educate our children, how we treat various mental diseases or conditions, how we care for our elderly--these are just some of the issues that can be informed by a better understanding of brain ...

An examination of what makes us human and unique among all creatures—our brainsNo listener curious about our "little gray cells" will want to pass up Harvard neuroscientist John E. Dowling's brief introduction to the brain. In this up-to-date revision of his 1998 book Creating Mind, Dowling conveys the essence and vitality of the field of neuroscience—examining the progress we've made in understanding how brains work, and shedding light on discoveries havi...

A “masterful” (The Washington Post Book World) account of the quest to solve one of the great mysteries in Russian history—from the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Peter the Great, Nicholas and Alexandra, and Catherine the Great“Riveting . . . unfolds like a detective story.”—Los Angeles Times Book ReviewIn July 1991, nine skeletons were exhumed from a shallow mass grave near Ekaterinburg, Siberia, a few...

**NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • An “absorbing” (Los Angeles Times) biography of one of the most remarkable, powerful, and captivating women in Russian history—from the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Peter the Great, Nicholas and Alexandra, and The Romanovs“[A] compelling portrait not just of a Russian titan, but also of a flesh-and-blood woman.”—NewsweekONE OF ESQUIRE’S BEST BIOGRAPHIES OF ALL TIME • ONE OF THE BEST BOOK...

In a work of extraordinary narrative power, filled with brilliant personalities and vivid scenes of dramatic action, Robert K. Massie, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Peter the Great, Nicholas and Alexandra, and Dreadnought, elevates to its proper historical importance the role of sea power in the winning of the Great War.The predominant image of this first world war is of mud and trenches, barbed wire, machine guns, poison gas, and slaughter. A generation of European manhood ...

A riveting account of the Wars of the Roses, from the beloved and bestselling historian Alison WeirThe war between the houses of Lancaster and York was characterised by treachery, deceit and bloody battles. Alison Weir's lucid and gripping account focuses on the human side of history. At the centre of the book stands Henry VI, the pious king whose mental instability led to political chaos, and his wife Margaret of Anjou, who took up her arms in her husband’s cause and battled in a ...

A fresh look at the endlessly fascinating Tudors—the dramatic and overlooked story of Henry VII and his founding of the Tudor Dynasty—filled with spies, plots, counter-plots, and an uneasy royal succession to Henry VIIINear the turn of the sixteenth century, England had been ravaged for decades by conspiracy and civil war. Henry Tudor clambered to the top of the heap, a fugitive with a flimsy claim to England’s crown who managed to win the throne and stay on it for twenty-four year...

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BYThe New York Times Book Review • The Economist • The Christian Science Monitor • Bloomberg Businessweek • The Globe and MailFrom the bestselling and award-winning author of Paris 1919 comes a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction, a fascinating portrait of Europe from 1900 up to the outbreak of World War I.The century since the end of the Napoleonic wars had been the most peaceful era Europe h...