A Field Guide for Science Writers: The Official Guide of the National Association of Science Writers,   ISBN:9780195174991

Customer Rating: 

I am a recently retired scientist and finally have the time to do some things important to me such as science writing. So I looked for a source to guide and inspire me. The Field Guide is all I could have wanted.

The editors have selected some of the best in the field to write and update the chapters. They begin each chapter with a helpful introduction to it's author. The Field Guide has excellent, timely, and useful information. It contains 'how to' chapters, 'where to look' and 'how to interview' chapters. Strunk and White would be impressed with the many examples of good writing. The Elements of Style, Fourth Edition

If you're a science writer, or want to be, you need the Field Guide as a reference and inspiration.

Customer Rating: 

This is a good book. It has some great examples of science and nature writing. I enjoyed reading a lot of the pieces in it, especially the one on plastics in the North Pacific Gyre.

Customer Rating: 

Doing science writing without reading this is like preaching in a Baptist church without having read the Bible.

Buy it. Read it. Keep it at your elbow.

Customer Rating: 

I'm one of the co-editors of the second edition of Field Guide, and I'd like to point out that most of the customer reviews posted here refer to the first edition. We've changed just about everything in this version, including the font size. Most importantly, we have a huge list of world-class contributors -- Tim Ferris, Phil Yam, Tom Siegfried, Lew Cope, Nancy Shute, David Everett, Carey Goldberg, Ron Seely, Lee Hotz, Janice Tanne, Colin Norman, Joe Palca, Kathryn Brown, Carl Zimmer, Alan Boyle, Tammy Powledge, Mariette DiChristina, Gareth Cook, Antonio Regalado, Rob Kunzig, George Johnson, Jamie Shreeve, Rob Kanigel, Shannon Brownlee, Marilyn Chase, Sally Squires, Paul Raeburn, Kevin Begos, Steve Hall, Ken Chang, Michael Lemonick, Andy Revkin, McCay Jenkins, Glennda Chui, Usha Lee McFarling, Cris Russell, John Toon, Earle Holland, Joann Rodgers, Colleen Henrichsen, Frank Blanchard, Mary Miller, Marion Glick, and James Gleick. We tried to get Amazon to update their information on this page, but no luck -- so you'll have to just browse in some other way. Believe me, it's a beautiful and useful book.

Customer Rating: 

As a fairly experienced science writer - http://www.sciencebase.com/resume.html - I didn't anticipate learning any news tricks from this book, but it's well worth checking out if your journalistic beat is anything from astronomy to zoology by way of molecular architecture and quantum mechanics