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Showing posts with the label science

Non-fiction Review: Portrait of the Scientist as a Young Woman

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How could I not be drawn to a title like that?! Another report from my on-going perusal of semi-randomly selected non-fiction audio books, especially about women doing cool stuff.   Title: Portrait of the Scientist as a Young Woman Author: Lindy Elkins-Tanton Publication Info: Harper Audio, 2022. 8hrs 40 min. Hardcover 2022 by William Morrow, 272 pages. Source: Publisher's Blurb: Deep in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, three times farther from the sun than the Earth is, orbits a massive asteroid called (16) Psyche. It is one of the largest objects in the belt, potentially containing the equivalent of the world's total economy in metals, though they cannot be brought back to Earth. But (16) Psyche has the potential to unlock something even more valuable: the story of how planets form, and how our planet formed. Soon we will find out, thanks to the extraordinary work of Lindy Elkins-Tanton, the Principal Investigator of NASA's $800 million Psyche mission,

Non-fiction audiobook review: The Ice at the End of the World

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 I missed Friday's post entirely. I noticed it late in the day, but didn't really feel like rushing something together even for a "photo Saturday" post. Instead, I'm skipping ahead, and getting a start on this week's posts. The thing is--I'm writing! Still, I have a review for today. Title: The Ice at the End of the World: An Epic Journey Into Greenland's Buried Past and Our Perilous Future Author: Jon Gertner; read by Fred Sanders Publication Info: Random House Audio, 2019. 13 hrs. Original hardback published 2019, Random House. 418 pages. Source: Library digital resources Publisher’s Blurb: Greenland: a remote, mysterious island five times the size of California but with a population of just 56,000. The ice sheet that covers it is 700 miles wide and 1,500 miles long, and is composed of nearly three quadrillion tons of ice. For the last 150 years, explorers and scientists have sought to understand Greenland--at first hoping that it would serve as

Middle Grade Monday: The Voice of the Xenolith

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  Title: The Voice of the Xenolith Author: Cynthia Pelman Publisher: Grosvenor House Publishing, 2015. 214 pages (in paperback) Source: Library digital resources Publisher's Blurb: Thirteen-year-old Amethyst does not get on with her teachers. Her classmates think she is weird. She prefers to be on her own, and she wishes she did not have to go to school. Amethyst reads detective stories, collects fossils, loves archaeology, and is writing her own dictionary. She has trained herself to become an expert in tracking, searching and following clues, and she uses these detective skills to search for someone who was murdered seventy years ago. Amethyst reaches out across time and space and in doing so finds her own voice among the many meanings of silence. My Review:  I picked up this book because it seemed to fit a theme being explored on the Goodreads group Great Middle Grade Reads; i.e., girls in science. To some degree, that is true, as Amethyst is definitely interested in a

Middle Grade Review: The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate

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  Title: The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate Author: Jacqueline Kelly Publication Info: Henry Holt & Co., 2009. 344 pages. Source: Library digital resources Publisher’s Blurb: Calpurnia Virginia Tate is eleven years old in 1899 when she wonders why the yellow grasshoppers in her Texas backyard are so much bigger than the green ones. With a little help from her notoriously cantankerous grandfather, an avid naturalist, she figures out that the green grasshoppers are easier to see against the yellow grass, so they are eaten before they can get any larger. As Callie explores the natural world around her, she develops a close relationship with her grandfather, navigates the dangers of living with six brothers, and comes up against just what it means to be a girl at the turn of the century. Debut author Jacqueline Kelly deftly brings Callie and her family to life, capturing a year of growing up with unique sensitivity and a wry wit. My Review: I liked this book a lot. The title ch

Memoir Review: Lab Girl (audio book)

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Title: Lab Girl Author: Hope Jahren (Audio read by the author) Publication Info: Random House Audio, 2016. Hardcover by Knopf, 2016 (290 pages) Source:  Library digital resources Publisher's Blurb: Acclaimed scientist Hope Jahren has built three laboratories in which she’s studied trees, flowers, seeds, and soil. Her first book is a revelatory treatise on plant life—but it is also so much more. Lab Girl is a book about work, love, and the mountains that can be moved when those two things come together. It is told through Jahren’s stories: about her childhood in rural Minnesota with an uncompromising mother and a father who encouraged hours of play in his classroom’s labs; about how she found a sanctuary in science, and learned to perform lab work done “with both the heart and the hands”; and about the inevitable disappointments, but also the triumphs and exhilarating discoveries, of scientific work. Yet at the core of this book is the story of a relationship Jahren forged with a br