Stephen Jay Gould needs no introduction as he is probably the best-known popularizer of the biological and earth sciences who is also a practising scientist. Likewise his ongoing series of "Essays in Natural History" should need little or no introduction. He writes a regular monthly essay for the popular science magazine Natural History (now totalling over 270), which is the house journal of the American Museum of Natural History. This is now the eighth volume of his selections from this magazine to be published in book format. In these essays he deals with topics ranging from the history of palaeontology, palaeolithic art and depiction of the giant deer's hump, to Martian canals and various biological "bit" players, such as carnivorous sponges.

His "nose" for the scent of a good story and his ability to tell one is well known, as is his erudition, wit and way with words. Gould is not just a brilliant reporter and storyteller but an active palaeobiologist with an enthusiasm for evolution. As Gould says in his opening piece, called "The Upwardly Mobile Fossils", Leonardo da Vinci used his "concept of the universe to pose the great questions, and to organize the subjects and phenomena"—so does Gould. You may not always agree with him and his erudition can verge on the wearisome, but anyone interested in our place and responsibility as humans in the natural world will find something worthwhile amongst this collection. —Douglas Palmer