Valentina Hannigan Hannigan من عند نيويورك من عند نيويورك

There are some real whoppers of biographies out there on Darwin (not to mention the autobiographical whopper in the form of his letters), so this short portrait is the perfect choice for normal people. Quammen's prose is zesty as always and he gets to the heart of evolutionary theory, the early 19th century scientific environment, and the extraordinary quirks and gifts of Darwin's personality with an efficiency I appreciated.