Heart of Darkness: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Invisible Universe

Jeremiah P. Ostriker and Simon Mitton. Princeton University Press 288 pp. $27.95 (2013)

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In this sweeping chronicle of cosmology, astrophysicist Jeremiah Ostriker and science historian Simon Mitton seamlessly blend historical narrative with lucid scientific explication, from the deeps of classical time to the data-fuelled hyperdrive of the past 50 years. The authors shine what light there is on dark matter and dark energy — a combination Ostriker has helped to pioneer in his models — but admit that the picture is incomplete and plenty of discovery awaits.

Heat: Adventures in the World's Fiery Places

  • Bill Streever
Little, Brown 368 pp. $26.99 (2013)

Biologist Bill Streever might be forgiven for switching from Cold, his debut best-seller, to Heat: he lives in Alaska. This intense, pacy ride through the thermal kicks off with thirst and ends with quarks freed by heat at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, New York. In between, Streever treats us to California wildfires and the chaparral they feed on, John Tyndall's discovery of greenhouse gases, the culinary chemistry of Hervé This, arson, Hawaiian lava fields, atomic bombs, charcoal-burning and even fire-walking. Simmering with verve throughout.

The King of Infinite Space: Euclid and His Elements

  • David Berlinski
Basic Books 192 pp. $24 (2013)

Fifty years might be a triumphant span for today's textbooks. Euclid's Elements is still fresh after 2,300. As mathematician David Berlinski writes in this pared and elegant homage to the peerless geometer and his magnum opus, the influence of Euclid's axiomatic system remains vast. Berlinski unpacks the axioms, propositions and proofs along with their passage through history — from their influence on Copernicus and Bertrand Russell (who called his encounter with Elements “as dazzling as first love”) to the non-Euclidean world that sprang open in the nineteenth century.

Radiation: What It Is, What You Need to Know

Robert Peter Gale and Eric Lax. Knopf 288 pp. $26.95 (2013)

Medical veteran of hot zones from Chernobyl to Fukushima, Robert Peter Gale — haematologist, oncologist and expert in bone-marrow transplants — delivers a guide for those perplexed by radiation. With science writer Eric Lax, Gale weighs up the risks and benefits of industrial, medical and natural radiation clearly, logically and with ample science. But it is Gale's phenomenal frontline experience that gives this book edge — not least a bizarre incident in Goiânia, Brazil, where caesium-137 scavenged from an abandoned radiation-therapy machine eventually affected more than 100,000 locals.

Arcadian America: The Death and Life of an Environmental Tradition

  • Aaron Sachs
Yale University Press 496 pp. $35 (2013)

From Yosemite to Yellowstone, the US national parks remain a historical touchstone for national environmentalism — but not the only one, argues Aaron Sachs. In a rich mix of history, cultural critique and memoir, Sachs reveals the cemetery as a half-forgotten nineteenth-century landscape tradition. These micro-Arcadias inspired close observation of nature in increasingly urbanized spaces, as well as contemplation of mortality and the sublime.