Dear Science Readers,
With the July 4 holiday approaching, I am always ready to celebrate the "one nation,... indivisible, with liberty and justice for all" to which I pledged my allegiance daily in school, both before and after the addition of "under God," a phrase which has proven to be surprisingly contentious of late.
Now I'm sure I have readers on both sides of that issue, and I won't state my point of view here. But I'd hazard a guess that all of us agree that we live in a remarkable country that allows us to argue that point with risking governmental retribution.
Since I mail out a lot of books from my local post office, I also get regular reminders of how precious the privilege to speak out can be. There's a warning on the counter about mailing packages containing liquid, fragile, perishable, or potentially hazardous materials. By now, the clerks know my standard answer to the question about the contents of my packages. Books are indeed potentially hazardous, especially to idealogues. They are designed to inspire questions and transform the way readers view the world.
I have chosen a career in which I create such dangers and introduce them to youngsters. In some countries, I'd live in fear of a midnight visit from the police. So I say "God bless America," even as I question the basic premise of that invocation.
The latest additions to the Science Shelf include my review of 
The Botanist and the Vintner: How Wine Was Saved for the Worldby Christy Campbell. It appeared in the Seattle Times (650 words), the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel (575 words), and the Dallas Morning News (450 words). The online version is a bit longer (800 words) and includes links to other books that deal with the ecological damage that can occur when foreign organisms are purposely or accidentally introduced to an area.
I've also uploaded excerpts of my review of the compelling 
Master Mind: The Rise and Fall of Fritz Haber, the Nobel Laureate Who Launched the Age of Chemical Warfare by Daniel Charles. I was thoroughly captivated by the way the author portrays the man, the history, the science, and the moral ambiguities. The long version of the review (1280 words) will appear in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. The Dallas and Milwaukee papers, and perhaps others, will publish shorter versions. As soon as it appears in print, I'll replace the excerpts with the full review.
My reading list includes one title that is likely to generate some fireworks, 
The Republican War on Science by Chris Mooney (Basic Books, September). Once I publish my review in the Dallas Morning News and on the Science Shelf, I'd be glad to add comments by readers who may see the book differently. More about reader reviews below.
Also on my reading stack are
Stargazer the Life and Times of the telescope by Fred Watson (Perseus, August),
The Planets by Dava Sobel (Viking, October),
and 
Our Inner Ape by Frans de Waal (Riverhead, October).
I'm eagerly awaiting 
Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife by Mary Roach (Norton, October). I hope to have as much fun in reviewing it as I had for Ms. Roach's earlier 
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers.
Over the past few years, my book reviewing has earned me the attention of publishers who send me books and delivery people who drop them off. I can't review them all, but I can at least give them some attention on my "Books Received" page. I'd like to do more than that, so I am willing to offer my advance reading copies of those books without charge to Science Shelf readers who commit to writing a review for the site. If you're interested, you'll find a link to e-mail me about that here.
I'm also looking for a reviewer of an interesting self-published space adventure novel. I normally shy away from self-published books, but Charles Boyle looks like he understands what it takes to write -- and edit -- so that readers will enjoy his work. He also has a very intriguing biography and a great sense of humor. (He attributes his success as a record-holding Senior Oympian to competing against old men.)
Here's a bit of what he sent me. Any takers?
NASA astronauts will soon return to flight. Their launch to the space station will coincide with the launch of Shuttle Rising, a space adventure novel by one of NASA's own, author Charles Boyle, a veteran of 32 years with the space agency.
"The mutual timing is uncanny," said Boyle, "given that I've been working on this story off and on for nine years." Asked why the novel took that long to complete, Boyle said, "Decades of writing for the government were not good preparation for writing a novel."
Subtitled To Rendezvous With A Rumor, Boyle's gripping science fiction/techno-thriller/romance rings with authenticity, clarity, drama and excitement. Set in the near future, its plot is driven by the behavior of a Russia that has returned to Communism and is undermining a proposed UN treaty to inspect all nations for weapons of mass destruction, saying the integrity of its word alone makes inspection unnecessary....
Charles Boyle served as Educational Programs Manager for Earth Sciences at the Goddard Space Flight Center, near Washington, DC. Prior to NASA, he worked at Bell Labs, Esso, Scott Paper, Western Electric, and US Steel. Boyle's writing has appeared in Science and Omni magazines. He served as space flight editor for the McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science and Technology, wrote a column called "Space Appreciation" for the Journal of Aerospace Education and has been a contributing editor to various space advocacy publications including Space World, Ad Astra, and Aviation/Space Magazine. Time Magazine quoted from "Boyle's Other Laws," a gathering of his aphorisms.
Boyle received a Mechanical Engineering degree from Tulane, an M.B.A. in Business Administration from N. Y. U., and a physics major Masters in Education from Harvard. A scuba diver, sailboat racer, and "ancient athlete," Boyle won two gold medals in track at the 2001 National Senior Olympics. In 2004, he set a new American age-group record in the USA Track&Field Masters 3000 meter racewalk.
He served with the U.S. Maritime Service and the U.S. Navy, 1943-1947.
In the "Linkstuff" department, the Science Shelf World Year of Physics 2005 page has been added as a link in at least two places on the American Institute of Physics Center for the History of Physics site, and other AIP and Einstein history pages. That is bringing the Science Shelf a fair amount of new traffic.
I've added an outgoing link to a new website called SciLitera
, which has been created by a young man named Hisham S. Ayoub who has a wonderful passion for science, literature, and culture. He's obviously very intelligent as he has selected a number of Science Shelf book reviews to get the site started :) . Remember, SciLitera is still in its early stages, but I have discovered that Hisham is open to comments and suggestions. Drop in and sign up for his newsletter, or just send him a note of encouragement if you like what you see.
Finally, I want to pass along a couple of items that came across my desk in recent e-mails. Both have a political point of view, but the issues are important enough to me to risk annoying my friends by raising them here.
The first one comes from the American Geophysical Union. It discusses what is to me a very disturbing trend, the muddling of scientific presentations by introducing non-falsifiable hypotheses. I don't mind debating whether we need an intelligent designer to understand the world, but that belongs in a philosophical or religious context, not a scientific one.
The second, from the online version of E-Magazine, relates to a new book about the future of oil. I've added a link to buy that book to my existing review of two books on the subject
I'll close by repeating my standard "word from our sponsor" and the usual reminders.
I'm not very good at making sales pitches, because I think that the value of a service ought to be apparent. But I realize that even my most loyal readers need a reminder that they can help me recover the cost of this site and generate a small amount for my efforts without spending a penny more than they normally would. I have added a prominent gateway link to Amazon.com on the main page of The Science Shelf. If you have some book shopping to do, or if you want to buy anything else that Amazon sells (even a George Foreman grill for those spring and summer cookouts), please use your Science Shelf bookmark -- you do have it bookmarked, don't you? -- and click that link to Amazon.com. Or this one.
Please consider updating your bookmarks or favorites to replace your old Amazon.com entry point with that URL (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect-home/drfredsplac).
And remember, if you learn about a book through a page on the Science Shelf site, you can make sure my efforts are rewarded by using the links on the Science Shelf page to buy that title.
Thanks!
I'm always glad to hear about your finds to share with other visitors to The Science Shelf. Please e-mail me the author and title, and I'll create a page for that book. I will either keep the recommendation anonymous, use your cyber-alias or, if you permit, your real name and/or e-mail address. Add a sentence or two or a more detailed review (up to 1000 words) and I'll consider it for publication here. See the Science Shelf guidelines page for more information.
Please feel free to send this URL (www.scienceshelf.com/news.htm) to your friends. And don't forget, you and they can join the Science Shelf's e-mail list to be alerted to the latest news at the site. Please be assured that I will not share your name or e-mail or use them for other purposes.
Happy summer science reading!
Fred Bortz
I also write children's science books, which you can learn more about at "Dr. Fred's Place".
Thanks for your interest. Please e-mail me comments and suggestions about my reviews or this website.
Note: All materials on this site are the copyrighted property of Alfred B. Bortz. Individuals may print single copies of reviews or columns for their own use. For permission to publish or print multiple copies of any of the materials on this site, please contact the author by e-mail.
