The Best American Science Writing 2008,   ISBN:9780061340413

Customer Rating: 

From the author of "A Beautiful Mind" this collection of significant advances in knowledge illuminates the collision of human health and corporate "voice". Woody Guthry and Sergey Brin put human faces on Huntingtons and Parkinsone ( and maybe Ronald Reagan on Alzheimers ? )
In the ensuing 2 years, the development of new tools for research has made Pre-implantation DNA testing possible for the prevention of Huntingtons births, so young parents need not forego having their own disease-free offspring
The 23and Me.com story is evolving, with a very significant engagement by Sergey Brin ( inventor of Google's search engine). Thanks to his wife, he now knows that his Mother's Parkinsons Disease (G2019S) is an autosomal dominant, and equally inherited by Berbers in North Africa and Ashkenazi jews ( Sergey was born in Moscow )
Thanks to Sergey, an anonymous data-base of 10,000 Parkinsons patients (at 23andMe.com) is now collecting the medical histories needed to discover the rules for Parkinsons beyond the DNA story ( eg herbicides Manganese, Agent Orange, etc )
I hope the 2011 edition of this book will carry a similar story of hope for Alzheimers
Personal note ,we have Both diseases (PD and Alz ) in our family.

Customer Rating: 

As usual, this year's editor has put together an excellent collection of Science Writing. But the thing I tend to like about the series is that it contains a little bit on a lot of subjects. Not so this time. The stories generally fall into four categories: genetics, ethics/exposé, the brain, and the environment.

Genetics: The first, Facing Life with a Lethal Gene is, unforgettably, about a girl who chooses to learn her genetic fate. The second, An Error in the Code, concerns a genetic defect that causes persons to tear themselves apart, while the third explains the benefits and limitations of the work done by genetic testing companies. In the ethics/exposé category falls six stories: How NIH Misread Hormone Study in 2002; Psychiatrists, Children, and Drug Industry's Role; What's Normal ["the controversy in diagnosing bipolar disorder in the very young"]; After Sanctions, Doctors Get Drug Company Pay; Dr. Drug Rep; When Is a Pain Doctor a Drug Pusher?; and Supply, Demand, and Kidney Transplants. Those involving the brain include: The Abyss [a man whose brain can not lay down memories], Duped [lie detection], and The Older-and-Wiser Hypothesis [Does wisdom increase with age?]. In the final, environment, category are four essays: a five pager by Al Gore on (what else) Global Warming, two about China (1 - the country is running out of water, 2 - a whistle-blower tried to sound the alarm on chemical factories' poisoning of a lake and suffered the consequences), and, finally, Sowing for Apocalypse, which I'd read elsewhere, about a Noah's Arkian collection of seeds from all over the world, kept safe in case of a cataclysmic event on earth. You see, only one piece, about the loss of effectiveness of the human body's evolution-related defenses against cancer, entitled Evolved for Cancer?, doesn't fit my categories. In summary, I'd like to say to next year's editor, more variety, please! Also good: A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar, The Best American Science and Nature Writing Series, and Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder.

Customer Rating: 

Too much focus on genetic/health issues. With all the amazing things going on in science, I would have expected a broader group of topics. That said, the stories presented were well written, with the possible exception of Al Gore's article.

Customer Rating: 

Disappointing in light of the previous books in this series. I missed the awe inspiring and thought provoking articles of previous years. Most of the selections have more to do with politics than science. Only four of the nineteen articles in this book deal with subjects outside of medical science. After reading the third article about the relationship between doctors and drug companies, one starts to wonder what kind of effort was put into their choices. The editors of his year's issue did not go far in their attempt to select the best writing.

Customer Rating: 

I agree with some of the other reviewers. The topics included in this "best of" volume are far too narrow. After reading three stories about doctors getting paid by big pharma, I gave up and jumped ahead - only to find more biomedical stories. While these may have been the most prominent in the news, surely there were other examples of outstanding scientific writing that deserved to be included here. I've found this series to be full of interesting reading in the past, but not this year (unless you want to read only about pharmaceuticals and genetics).