The Best of the Best of American Science Writing [Paperback]

Honoring the 10th anniversary of Ecco’s acclaimed Best American Science Writing series, here isBest of the Best of American Science Writing.

What happens when the decade's greatest science writers are asked to curate their own legacy?The Best of the Best American Science Writingis the answer — an anthology of anthologies, gathering ten distinguished editors and asking each one a deceptively simple question: of everything you championed, what two pieces would you bring to the table?

The result is a collection that reveals as much about the choosers as the chosen. James Gleick, whoseChaosredefined how we understand complexity, selected pieces that pull medicine's hidden failures into the light. Oliver Sacks, the incomparable neurologist-poet, chose writing as tender and precise as his own. Atul Gawande, Natalie Angier, Sylvia Nasar, Timothy Ferris — each editor's two picks become a kind of intellectual self-portrait.

From the operating theater to the cosmos, from the politics of dietary fat to the inner life of a parrot, these twenty pieces represent a decade of fearless, essential science writing. With an introduction by Jerome Groopman,The Best of the Best American Science Writingis not just a survey of our times — it is an argument for why science writing matters.

For a decade, Ecco has published the most outstanding science writing in America, collected in highly acclaimed annual volumes edited by some of the most impressive and most important names in science and science writing today: James Gleick, Timothy Ferris, Matt Ridley, Oliver Sacks, Dava Sobel, Alan Lightman, Atul Gawande, Gina Kolata, Sylvia Nasar, and Natalie Angier.

Now series editor Jesse Cohen invites the previous guest editors to select their favorite essays for this one-of-a-kind anthology. The result is an outstanding compendium—the best science writing of the new millennium, featuring an introductl“¡