The NASW bookstore sells books, music, video, software, and other merchandise via Amazon.com. Every purchase you make on Amazon can support NASW programs and services: Just go to https://www.nasw.org/amazon when you start your shopping. Books featured below were written by NASW members or reviewed in ScienceWriters magazine. Appearance here does not indicate endorsement.
In 1890s Paris, modern dance pioneer Loie Fuller dazzled Folies Bergere audiences with her swirling movements and inventive lighting. Later, she sought Marie Curie’s newly discovered glow-in-the-dark element, radium, to apply to her costumes. Liz Heinecke’s Radiant: The Dancer, The Scientist, and a Friendship Forged in Light tells the story of Fuller’s and Curie’s professional and personal ties.
Parents who serve meat to their children eventually have to talk about how the animal lived and died, whether eating meat is healthy, and how meat production affects the environment, says Christoph Droesser. He addresses these concerns in his book for children aged 8+, It’s about Sausage: What you have to know if you like to eat meat, currently available only in German.
Cystic fibrosis, a hereditary disease often fatal in early decades of life, parents raising millions of dollars to support research, and scientists working at the cutting edge of gene therapies comprise threads of a riveting narrative Bijal P. Trivedi weaves together in Breath from Salt: A Deadly Genetic Disease, a New Era in Science, and the Patients and Families Who Changed Medicine Forever.
“We need more detergent,” I told my husband. “I can help you with that,” my phone offered, unasked. I wasn’t aware it was eavesdropping. For the first time in history, humans can interact verbally with non-human entities, says Christoph Droesser. Are these genuine conversations? Droesser explores this question in When Things Talk to Us: Voice Assistants, Computers as Authors and Social Bots.
In the US 100 years ago, boys often wore pink, and girls, blue. Pink & blue codes reversed in the 1950s, after Mamie Eisenhower embraced pink, Lisa Selin Davis reports in Tomboy: The Surprising History and Future of Girls Who Dare To Be Different. Kids who reject gender stereotypes—colors, toys, clothes, activities, & behaviors—Davis says, typically become well-rounded, self-confident adults.
A violent crime piques the interest of Toxicology Professor, Alex Pendergraf. As he investigates the crime further, Pendergraf uncovers the source of the violence, an infectious prion that preferentially infects males and is able to easily jump from one species to the next. Pendergraf and his team slowly peel back the uncertainties surrounding the infectious agent as they try to head off more violence, but are they too late?
Imagine vacationing at a hotel in low-earth orbit, within 200 miles of the Earth’s surface—a genuine out-of-this-world experience. Though daunting challenges remain, the potential for scientific advances, mining profits, and the thrill of space tourism likely will stimulate heightened space exploration, Christopher Wanjek writes in Spacefarers: How Humans Will Settle the Moon, Mars, and Beyond.
The notion that the penis is the throbbing obelisk of all masculinity is a fallacy, Emily Willingham asserts in Phallacy: Life Lessons from the Animal Penis. Willingham, a PhD in biological sciences who writes and teaches about how gonads and penises develop and work, provides an entertaining survey of flabby studies with a patriarchal perspective, supporting her conclusions with hard science.
Cannabis, approved for medical use in at least 35 states, also is available without a prescription in 11 states, Washington DC, and 2 US territories. These stats suggest it’s high time for Cheryl Pellerin’s guidebook on why & how cannabis works in the body, Healing with Cannabis: The Evolution of the Endocannabinoid System and How Cannabinoids Help Relieve PTSD, Pain, MS, Anxiety, and More.