Here is a multidimensional playland of ideas from the world'smost eccentric Nobel-Prize winning scientist. Kary Mullis islegendary for his invention of PCR, which redefined the world ofDNA, genetics, and forensic science. He is also a surfer, a veteranof Berkeley in the sixties, and perhaps the only Nobel laureate todescribe a possible encounter with aliens. A scientist of boundlesscuriosity, he refuses to accept any proposition based on secondhandor hearsay evidence, and always looks for the "money trail" whenscientists make announcements.
In this nuanced and complex portrait of Barack Obama,Pulitzer Prize-winner David Remnick offers a thorough, intricate,and riveting account of the unique experiences that shaped ournation’s first African American president. Through extensive on-the-record interviews with friends andteachers, mentors and disparagers, family members and Obamahimself, Remnick explores the elite institutions that first exposedObama to social tensions, and the intellectual currents thatcontributed to his identity. Using America’s racial history as abackdrop for Obama’s own story, Remnick further reveals how aninitially rootless and confused young man built on the experiencesof an earlier generation of black leaders to become one of thecentral figures of our time. Masterfully written and eminently readable, The Bridge isdestined to be a lasting and illuminating work for years to come,by a writer with an unparalleled gift for revealing the historicalsignificance of our present moment.
This comprehensive, original portrait of the life and work ofone of America's greatest poets--set in the social, cultural, andpolitical context of his time--considers the full range of writingsby and about Whitman, including his early poems and stories, hisconversations, letters, journals, newspaper writings, and daybooks. of photos.
Andrew Jackson, his intimate circle of friends, and histumultuous times are at the heart of this remarkable book about theman who rose from nothing to create the modern presidency. Belovedand hated, venerated and reviled, Andrew Jackson was an orphan whofought his way to the pinnacle of power, bending the nation to hiswill in the cause of democracy. Jackson’s election in 1828 usheredin a new and lasting era in which the people, not distant elites,were the guiding force in American politics. Democracy made itsstand in the Jackson years, and he gave voice to the hopes and thefears of a restless, changing nation facing challenging times athome and threats abroad. To tell the saga of Jackson’s presidency,acclaimed author Jon Meacham goes inside the Jackson White House.Drawing on newly discovered family letters and papers, he detailsthe human drama–the family, the women, and the inner circle ofadvisers–that shaped Jackson’s private world through years of stormand victory. One of our most significant
“Christopher Hogwood came home on my lap in a shoebox. He wasa creature who would prove in many ways to be more human than Iam.” –from The Good Good Pig A naturalist who spent months at a time living on her own amongwild creatures in remote jungles, Sy Montgomery had always feltmore comfortable with animals than with people. So she gladlyopened her heart to a sick piglet who had been crowded away fromnourishing meals by his stronger siblings. Yet Sy had no inklingthat this piglet, later named Christopher Hogwood, would not onlysurvive but flourish–and she soon found herself engaged with hersmall-town community in ways she had never dreamed possible.Unexpectedly, Christopher provided this peripatetic traveler withsomething she had sought all her life: an anchor (eventuallyweighing 750 pounds) to family and home. The Good Good Pig celebrates Christopher Hogwood in all hisglory, from his inauspicious infancy to hog heaven in rural NewHampshire, where his boundless zest for life a
In the first full-scale biography of Mary Stuart in more thanthirty years, John Guy creates an intimate, gripping portrait ofone of history's greatest women and depicts her world and her placein the sweep of history with stunning immediacy. Bringing togetherall surviving documents and uncovering a trove of new sources forthe first time, Guy dispels the popular image of Mary Queen ofScots as a romantic leading ladyachieving her ends through femininewiles and establishes her as the intellectual and political equalof Elizabeth I. Through Guy's pioneering research and "fabulouslyreadable" prose, we come to see Mary as a skillful diplomat,maneuvering ingeniously among a dizzying array of factions thatsought to control or dethrone her. An enthralling, myth-shatteringlook at a complex woman and ruler and her time, Queen of Scots"reads like Shakespearean drama, with all the delicious plottingand fresh writing to go with it" (AtlantaJournal-Constitution).
