Something I struggle with when reading accessible science books is occasionally getting frustrated that a concept has been simplified so greatly that you lose track of it entirely. I get that it’s a really hard balance to strike, but I think the best examples of how to do it well are The Gene: An Intimate History by Siddhartha Mukherjee and Zoobiquity. Both strike a great balance between accuracy, accessibility, and entertainment. I can tell because when I read these books, I’m not annoyed. Instead, I just feel incredibly flattered because I know the information put in front of me, and who doesn’t like to feel smart every once in a while?
Not to mention, both of these books put a lot of effort into setting the scene for their points. Neither author just spills out their facts in a controlled but lack-luster manner. Rather, there’s some literary build up, some personal anecdotes, or a healthy dose of humor to keep their readers engaged in the material. It’s sort of like a teacher intentionally using multiple Expo marker colors to make sure the kids in their AP Bio class are paying attention.
At the end of the day though, a lot of the smaller details in this book were new facts to me, like ladybugs getting STDs (wtf), daylight affecting eating disorders (relating a lot to Seasonal Affective Disorder, if you ask me), or rowdy zebra finches tempting fate by sitting on a human’s finger. That means that even for a college student studying pre-med, anthropology, and biology, there’s valuable and interesting information to get out of the book. Not to mention, as a pre-med student, I was really taught the value of inter-species study/medicine to better understand human conditions (which is something I really don’t expect to be covered in med school). So now, I get to walk around spilling even more random facts to people who never asked for them- WHOOP WHOOP!