Air-Borne

An extraordinary history of the perils and promise of every breath we takeJames Nestor, New York Times bestselling author of Breath

Another brilliant work from one of the very best science writers, Air-Borne will leave you agog at the incredible world that floats unseen around us, and outraged at the forces that stopped us from appreciating that world until, for many people, it was too late. It is a book about how much there is still left to know, and how frustrating it can be to turn knowledge into wisdomEd Yong, New York Times bestselling author of An Immense World

A fish doesn’t know it’s wet. And we rarely recognize that we are bathed in air, air carrying multitudes of microbes. Air-Borne chronicles the history of this insight. With Zimmer’s usual superb writing, it is filled with fascinating science, visionary scientists who were often completely wrong, and poignant moments reflecting the vast human suffering caused by such microbes. And throughout is the dread that makes Air-Borne a page-turner – the knowledge that the air eventually carried SARS-Cov2 and may yet bring something worse. Air-Borne is deeply important and unsettlingRobert Sapolsky, New York Times bestselling author of Determined

Carl Zimmer details the long history of studying microbes in the air and explains why that science got derailed. It’s a fascinating and also cautionary taleWalter Isaacson, New York Times bestselling author of The Code Breaker