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Book summary and reviews of The Canon by Natalie Angier

The Canon by Natalie Angier

The Canon

A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science

by Natalie Angier

  • Critics' Consensus:
  • Published:
  • May 2007
    304 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

The Canon is a joyride through the major scientific disciplines: physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and astronomy. It’s vital reading for anyone who wants to understand the great issues of our time—from stem cells and bird flu to evolution and global warming. It’s also one of those rare books that reignites our childhood delight in figuring out how things work: we learn what’s actually happening when our ice cream melts or our coffee gets cold, what our liver cells do when we eat a caramel, how the horse shows evolution at work, and that we really are all made of stardust. It’s Lewis Carroll meets Lewis Thomas—a book that will enrapture, inspire, and enlighten.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"This is a pleasurable and nonthreatening guide for anyone baffled by science." - PW.

"The style is so lively that the more serious goal of fostering public science literacy is easily reached." - Library Journal.

"Not everything is as easy as pie (or pi) to grasp, and therein lies the excitement and challenge of science, masterfully conveyed here. " - Kirkus.

This information about The Canon was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

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More Information

The Canon was immediately grabbed from the book pile by our scientifically-minded in house reviewer, but the report is that, although Angier covers some interesting material, her writing style is a little hard-going - using unnecessarily complicated language when a simpler style would have better served her purposes.

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