Parasite Rex, Carl Zimmer
Parasite Rex, Carl Zimmer
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Parasite Rex
Inside the Bizarre World of Nature's Most Dangerous Creatures

Author: Carl Zimmer

Narrator: Charles Constant

Unabridged: 9 hr 30 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 05/08/2018


Synopsis

For centuries, parasites have lived in nightmares, horror stories, and the darkest shadows of science. In Parasite Rex, Carl Zimmer takes listeners on a fantastic voyage into the secret universe of these extraordinary life-forms—which are not only among the most highly evolved on Earth, but make up the majority of life's diversity. Traveling from the steamy jungles of Costa Rica to the parasite-riddled war zone of southern Sudan, Zimmer introduces an array of amazing creatures that invade their hosts, prey on them from within, and control their behavior. He also vividly describes parasites that can change DNA, rewire the brain, make men more distrustful and women more outgoing, and turn hosts into the living dead. This comprehensive, gracefully written book brings parasites out into the open and uncovers what they can teach us all about the most fundamental survival tactics in the universe—the laws of Parasite Rex.

About Carl Zimmer

Carl Zimmer is a columnist for the New York Times, where he has contributed articles since 2004. His writing has earned a number of awards, including the Stephen Jay Gould Prize, awarded by the Society for the Study of Evolution. His 2018 book, She Has Her Mother's Laugh: The Powers, Perversions, and Potential of Heredity, won the 2019 National Academies Communication Award and was named the best science book of 2018 by the Guardian. He is professor adjunct of biophysics and biochemistry and a lecturer in English at Yale University. He lives in Guilford, Connecticut.


Reviews

This book is disgusting almost beyond words. For instance there are 5,000 species of tape worm, and the one we associate with human beings can grow inside us, in our intestines, to be 60 feet long. And that is just the beginning of the disgustingness! Ewwwwww! On the other hand the book is utterly f......more

Goodreads review by George

Fascinating look at interdependent relationships among living organisms, the complex interactions between parasite and host, and how very little we know about the nature of life on earth. Beyond the creep factor, there is much here to think about. For example, does a healthy ecosystem actually depend......more

Wow, what a book! This is a non-fic that can change your world picture. When I started it, I expected more or less average run of the mill collection of stories about parasites. However, this is so much more! The book starts with initial theories of parasites: people observed them thru the centuries b......more