Reviews
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Science & SocietyThese are Science News’ favorite books of 2021
Our favorite books covered the Big Bang theory, human evolution, gene editing, how to define life, pseudoscience and more.
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AnimalsA new book shows how animals are already coping with climate change
‘Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid’ takes a clear-eyed look at future of animal life.
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Life‘Life as We Made It’ charts the past and future of genetic tinkering
A new book shatters illusions that human meddling with nature has only just begun.
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Anthropology‘The Dawn of Everything’ rewrites 40,000 years of human history
A new book recasts human social evolution as multiple experiments with freedom and domination that started in the Stone Age.
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Science & SocietyThe spoken word album ‘Experimental Words’ weaves rhyme with reason
The spoken word album Experimental Words, a collaboration between researchers and poets, explores the intersection between science and art.
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Climate‘Ice Rivers’ invites you to get to know our world’s melting glaciers
In her new book, Jemma Wadham brings readers along on her scientific expeditions to the world’s iciest places.
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AnimalsMary Roach’s new book ‘Fuzz’ explores the ‘criminal’ lives of animals
In “Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law,” author Mary Roach profiles mugging monkeys, thieving bears and other animal outlaws.
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Science & Society‘On the Fringe’ explores the thin line between science and pseudoscience
In his latest book, historian Michael Gordin surveys astrology, eugenics and other fringe movements to show how challenging it is to define pseudoscience.
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Cosmology‘Flashes of Creation’ recounts the Big Bang theory’s origin story
In ‘Flashes of Creation,’ author Paul Halpern tells the story of George Gamow , Fred Hoyle and their decades-long sparring match about the Big Bang.
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SpaceVera Rubin’s work on dark matter led to a paradigm shift in cosmology
‘Bright Galaxies, Dark Matter, and Beyond’ tells the story of how astronomer Vera Rubin provided key evidence for the existence of dark matter.
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EarthA new book reveals stories of ancient life written in North America’s rocks
In ‘How the Mountains Grew,’ John Dvorak probes the interlinked geology and biology buried within the rocks of North America.
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Life‘Wild Souls’ explores what we owe animals in a human-dominated world
The new book Wild Souls explores the ethical dilemmas of saving Earth’s endangered animals.