Unnatural Selection

“If you’ve ever wondered why you should care about evolution, Unnatural Selection is the book for you. And if you haven’t wondered that, you need to read this to find out what you’re missing. Environmental toxicologist Emily Monosson, with prose that is clear, succinct, and so interesting it’s hard to put the book down, explains how people are speeding up an evolutionary arms race both within and around us. And that arms race is between us, disease, pests, and many other species on Earth. A thoroughly engaging read for anyone that cares about the role of humans on our planet.”–Anthony Barnosky, Professor, Department of Integrative Biology, UC Berkeley and author of Heatstroke“Unnatural Selection is a well-written book in the tradition of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. It usefully updates that epochal work, engagingly presenting new research on the impact of chemical products from herbicides to antibiotics, both on other species and on ourselves. Despite its elegant brevity, it covers a satisfying breadth of ecological and evolutionary concerns in environmental toxicology. It can be safely offered as recommended reading for biology undergraduates, congressional staffers, or general readers who are concerned about the environment.”– “Trends in Ecology & Evolution”“Unnatural Selection is eye-opening and more than a little disquieting.”– “Science Book A Day”“The power of evolution, toxicologist Monosson (Evolution in a Toxic World) demonstrates, is quite amazing: when strong selective pressure is coupled with short generation times, significant changes in populations can occur over very brief intervals. … She concludes with an interesting, if tangential, discussion of epigenetics.”– “Publishers Weekly”“WOW! This deceptively slender book packs a helluva powerful punch….Unnatural Selection is an engaging and eye-opening book that is essential reading for everyone–city dwellers and country folk alike–who lives on planet Earth….Like reading a dystopian novel, this book will capture your imagination and keep you awake into the wee hours. But unlike a dystopian novel, the author actually proposes evolutionarily-sound strategies for what we can do to stop the damage before it becomes lasting.”– “The Guardian’s GrrlScientist blog”

Emily Monosson is an independent biochemical toxicologist, writer, consultant, and college instructor. She is an adjunct Professor at University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and teaches as a visiting faculty at Mount Holyoke College. She is the author of Evolution in a Toxic World and editor of Motherhood, the Elephant in the Laboratory (Cornell, 2008).