nonfiction (fictionalized). I didn't care for the writing style--a bit too cluttered/dense for me to enjoy.

A lot of interesting physiology, zoology, etc., enmeshed w/ a lot of psycho-social babble. Actual sex was omitted but there was some physiology of kissing. Because, as is usual with Bodanis, the treatment is excessively breezy, I felt intrigued by the first chapter, but unwilling to take on any more this month, as much of the narrative consists of factoids, without any real coherence or context. The illustrations, although enjoyable, don't seem to correspond well with the text.

The first chapter had a lot about demodex mites, but nothing about their size. The book gives the impression that there are whole herds of them roaming the faces of everyone. But they are actually kind of large, about 1/5th the size of a varroa mite, which can be seen with the naked eye. Various images seem to indicate that they are about the width of a human hair, which is large. This is all a bit confusing, if kind of interesting. I have read about these mites before, in a children's book, which pointed out that the do everything on our bodies but poop. They die and fall off before they ever need to, which is good, because they actually can't, apparently.

Another part of the first chapter was on the ingredients in commercial baby food. This was much more difficult to follow up on than the bit about demodex mites.

There was another remark about the ability of babies to distinguish between a large variety of sounds. Adults have their sound recognition optimized for the language they speak, and lose the ability to recognize distinctions not in their language. This is why adult Japanese speakers can not distinguish between the r and the l sound, but Japanse children can. This is a little broad, I bet an adult Japanese speaker could relearn by connecting hearing with pronouncing; i.e, if they could learn to pronounce the l and r differently, by manipulations, they could learn to hear the difference also.

Entertained, but ready to take a break from this book at page 30.

24-hours inside the mysterious world of our minds and bodies.

This shocking, up-close look at the everyday life of one family will capture many audiences. The text exposes the daily interactions of one family as they talk, eat, dress, play-as well as how their interact with the invisible likes of tapeworms, dust mites, bacteria, and many other forms microbes we all share on a daily basis. The text is packed with astonishing, up-close photos, facts, and real-life science that will change the way you look at life.

The Secret Family: Twenty-four Hours inside the Mysterious Worlds of Our Minds and Bodies by David Bodanis spends one day in the life of a typical suburban family - mother, father, teenage daughter, 10-year old son, and baby. The family wakes up, eats breakfast, putter around the house, visit the mall, return home and go to bed. Bodanis focuses on all the details of well, just about everything. Much of this is microscopic -- what microbes are crawling around the shafts of our eyebrows, what poison gases are welling up under the sink, what the hell are they putting in our food (big thing with Bodanis that gets huge gross-out points), and what germs are floating around the shopping mall. Bodanis also focuses on our human behavior, the things we do without even realizing it, and what qualities are predictors for that behavior. Technology, how it works, and how we work with it is also one of the many things explicated. Often Bodanis brings in brilliant if esoteric historical connections that are reminiscent of James Burke's Connections. Each page is filled with fascinating details and this book is well worth the read for a quick insight into everyday life. ( )