cover image Embryogenesis: Species, Gender, and Identity

Embryogenesis: Species, Gender, and Identity

Phoebe Gloeckner, Richard Grossinger, Jillian O'Malley. North Atlantic Books, $75 (952pp) ISBN 978-1-55643-359-7

The updated final volume in Richard Grossinger's trilogy of ""inquiry into origins and boundaries"" (Planet Medicine and The Night Sky were the first two), Embryogenesis: Species, Gender, and Identity, is another heavily and creatively researched effort, an ""inquiry into being alive."" Though it looks like a science book, it is as much (or more) concerned with language, memory and history as it is with procreation and embryology. Touching on everything from Darwin to Derrida, and with headings running the gamut from ""Chaos and Zen"" to ""The Universal Cellular Mold,"" this tome is for the reader with a large appetite for bold, eccentric investigations and with the leisure to digest such eclectic fare. ()