Spillover

A frightening and fascinating masterpiece of science reporting that reads like a detective story – Walter IsaacsonIt may have been eight years since David Quammen’s Spillover was first published, but its prescience is spookily topical this plague year – Richard Dawkins * New Statesman *Travelling deep into the rainforest with the scientists hoping to identify the next pandemic pathogen, Quammen’s book is plotted like a detective thriller – Gaia Vince * Guardian *Quammen’s book is compelling and shows that there are many candidates out there vying to be the next pandemic – Euan Lawson * British Journal of General Practice *Quammen has a wide range of knowledge, an agile pen, and a generous heart – James Gorman * New York Times Book Review *A tremendous book…this gives you all you need to know and all you should know. Quammen’s research and the analysis make sensationalism unnecessary – Bryan Appleyard * Sunday Times *Mr Quammen is not just among our best science writers but among our best writers, period…that he hasn’t won a non-fiction National Book Award or Pulitzer Prize is an embarrassment… Quammen is a patient explainer and a winning observer, he has a novelistic flair for describing his fellow humans… Quammen, combining physical and intellectual adventure, wraps his canny explorations into powerful moral witness – Dwight Garner * New York Times *One of that rare breed of science journalists who blend exploration with a talent for synthesis and storytelling… This is a timely, serious and impressive work that marks the maturation of a field of microbiology – Nathan Wolfe * Nature *Terrific…the stories of the victims and the scientists are told in astonishing detail – Caroline Ash * Guardian *He [Quammen] ranges with ease over decades and continents, drawing upon years of interviews and field trips with scientists…[he] is a lively writer and a good detective, tracing diseases from their first appearance back to their origins—in some cases, still unsettled… Quammen does not shy away from the lurid question of the “next big one” that will be on readers’ minds from the start * The Economist *

David Quammen is a recipient of the Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the author of several acclaimed natural history titles. His book, The Song of the Dodo, won the BP Natural World Book Prize in 1996.