==Popular science==
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{{newreview
|author=Geoffrey Miller
|title=Must-Have: The Hidden Instincts Behind Everything We Buy
|rating=4
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=If no one can tell the difference, why shell out $30 000 for a real Rolex when a 'mere' $1200 will get you a virtually identical replica?
Why do luxury manufacturers such as BMW spend money advertising in mass media whose typical readership most likely won't ever be able to afford their products?
And just why is the ''i'' in iPod so important?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099437929</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|summary=A look at Darwin's journey on The Beagle, as well as journeys by Joseph Hooker, Thomas Huxley and Alfred Wallace. Darwin's Armada provides a broad overview that strikes a different tone to other books in a crowded market. Casual readers who usually steer clear of non-fiction will enjoy it.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184737266X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Jerry A Coyne
|title=Why Evolution is True
|rating=5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=This book should not be needed.
The theory of evolution has huge explanatory and predictive powers and it is also, philosophically, a wonderful one to behold: it shows a unity of all living things and our human connection to them all; through the billions of years and millions of generations, from the first bacteria to the human beings capable of understanding the story of life as it unfolded on this planet, the story told by the evolution theory is an exhilarating one; possibly the greatest story ever told by science.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199230846</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Philip Ball
|title=Shapes
|rating=5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=''Shapes'' is one volume of a new trilogy born out of the author's 1999 book 'The Self-Made Tapestry: Pattern Formation in Nature', in which he surveyed a range of contemporary scientific investigation into the extent of nature's patterning with examples taken from areas such as plant growth, minerals, shells, desert sands, lightning, galaxies and atoms. This book has been restructured into the stand-alone volumes ''Shapes'', ''Flow'' and ''Branches'', with new material added.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199237964</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=John Gribbin and Michael White
|title=Darwin: A Life in Science
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=This straightforward and likeable biography of Charles Darwin charts the evolution of his theories of evolution, while providing solid insights into the man in the context of his upbringing, education and family life. Importantly, it makes you want to read ''On the Origin of the Species'', acting as a primer for the ideas introduced in that famous volume.
''Darwin: A Life in Science'' is pitched beautifully for the reader of popular science, yet gives plenty of signposts enabling future study. It also gives a very believable picture of Darwin, based on convincing evidence and without falling into florid psychological speculation.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847391494</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Patricia Fara
|title=Science: A Four Thousand Year History
|rating=5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=From Ancient Babylon to the present day, Patricia Fara presents a definitive history of science. It's wide-ranging enough to cover simply everything you could hope it would, whilst being in-depth enough so that you gain a sufficient understanding of the science and the people involved. It serves as a simple reference guide for the layperson - it's riddled with information, whilst also being perfectly readable as a 'biography of science'. If you ever wanted to know anything about the history of science, this is the book for you. Patricia Fara was also kind enough to be [[The Interview: Bookbag Talks to Patricia Fara|interviewed by Bookbag]].
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>019922689X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Neil deGrasse Tyson
|title=The Pluto Files: The Rise and Fall of America's Favourite Planet
|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=As director of the Hayden Planetarium, Neil deGrasse Tyson grouped the celestial bodies by type, rather than listing them under the arbitrary heading of 'planets'. This put Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars together in one group, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune together in another, and left poor little Pluto out in the cold. His aim was for people to gain a greater understanding, rather than just knowing the names. The result was widespread outrage amongst newspapers, schoolchildren and the public at large. It was a scientifically-sound position, and ultimately fuelled the International Astronomical Union to define what was and wasn't a planet. The Pluto Files is a fascinating, educational and hilarious journey from Pluto's discovery, through its rise in public consciousness (by way of Disney), to the controversy about its planetary status, its ultimate downgrading, and the public's response to it.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0393065200</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Michael D Lemonick
|title=The Georgian Star: How William and Caroline Herschel Revolutionized Our Understanding of the Cosmos
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=No-one can ever look at the night skies above our heads as Galileo did. The light pollution covering so much of our planet makes it impossible to see nearly as much as he might. Conversely, he would have adored living in a time such as ours – with the technology to show him so much he couldn't see, so much he daren't dream of. Sitting happily between those two extremes was William Herschel.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>039306574X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Sudhir Venkatesh
|title=Gang Leader For A Day
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=If you've ever wondered why young people join gangs, and what it's like to bring up a family surrounded by armed drug dealers, you'll find ''Gang Leader For The Day'' fascinating. Sociology student Sudhir Venkatesh wanted to learn by observing the poor, baulking at the abstract, mathematical research methods used by his professors in the University of Chicago. In 1989, armed with a clipboard and a questionnaire, he visited the Robert Taylor Homes, a notorious housing project. Instead of neatly answering his carefully-prepared questions - 'How does it feel to be black and poor?' by selecting from 'very bad, somewhat bad, neither bad nor good, somewhat good, very good', he finds himself held hostage overnight by members of the Black Kings, a crack-dealing gang, at the behest of its charismatic local leader, J.T.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141030917</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Michael Brooks
|title=13 Things That Don't Make Sense
|rating=4
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Did you know 96% of the cosmos is unaccounted for? That the Pioneer probes seem to be violating the laws of physics? That we might have already found life on Mars? That aliens might have made contact with us? Oh, and why do we die? Why do we have sex? (Hopefully not in that order). Do we really have free will? ''13 Things That Don't Make Sense'' might not make complete sense of all these, but it'll certainly fascinate you as it explains these and other questions.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861978170</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Adrian Desmond and James Moore
|title=Darwin's Sacred Cause: Race, Slavery and the Quest for Human Origins
|rating=5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=This probably won't be the only time you are told through 2009 that it would have been Charles Darwin's 200th birthday this year, and that it is 150 years since ''On The Origin of Species'' first appeared. This book however declares that second anniversary to be slightly of less importance, when you factor in the biggest section of his evolutionary thinking Darwin left out of that book – that of human evolution.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846140358</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Marcus Chown
|title=Quantum Theory Cannot Hurt You
|rating=4
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Classical physics, for the most, was concerned with (and reasonably good at explaining) medium-scale phenomena: and still now, as when they were discovered, Newton's laws allow us to quite accurately predict behaviour of roughly human-scale objects. Newton's laws and classical physics in general, fail when dealing with extremes of the largest and the smallest, the fastest and the slowest. ''Quantum Theory Cannot Hurt You'', subtitled ''A Guide to the Universe'' actually presents two revolutionary theories of modern physics: Quantum Mechanics which deals with the tiniest, atomic and sub-atomic scales and Einstein's general relativity which deals with the largest, cosmological scale.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571235468</amazonuk>
}}
