We're right in the middle of World War I, deep in the trenches. The soldiers are confronted by unimaginable suffering and violent death on a daily basis. Considered as nothing more than cannon fodder by their superiors, they try desperately to survive. Partly as an act of defiance in the face of hardship, partly as the ultimate irony, the soldiers nickname their regiment after the famous Parisian cabaret club 'Folies Bergère'. They laugh and joke, they write, they draw, they fight, they die in appalling circumstances, they kill themselves, they lose their minds. And then one of their number is sentenced to death by firing squad... and miraculously survives...

A New Scientist Book of the Year A Physics Today Book of the Year A Science News Book of the Year The history of science is replete with women getting little notice for their groundbreaking discoveries. Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, a tireless innovator who correctly theorized the substance of stars, was one of them. It was not easy being a woman of ambition in early twentieth-century England, much less one who wished to be a scientist. Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin overcame prodigious obstacles to become a woman of many firsts: the first to receive a PhD in astronomy from Radcliffe College, the first promoted to full professor at Harvard, the first to head a department there. And, in what has been called “the most brilliant PhD thesis ever written in astronomy,” she was the first to describe what stars are made of. Payne-Gaposchkin lived in a society that did not know what to make of a determined schoolgirl who wanted to know everything. She was derided in college and refused a degree. As a graduate student, she faced formidable skepticism. Revolutionary ideas rarely enjoy instantaneous acceptance, but the learned men of the astronomical community found hers especially hard to take seriously. Though welcomed at the Harvard College Observatory, she worked for years without recognition or status. Still, she accomplished what every scientist yearns for: discovery. She revealed the atomic composition of stars—only to be told that her conclusions were wrong by the very man who would later show her to be correct. In What Stars Are Made Of, Donovan Moore brings this remarkable woman to life through extensive archival research, family interviews, and photographs. Moore retraces Payne-Gaposchkin’s steps with visits to cramped observatories and nighttime bicycle rides through the streets of Cambridge, England. The result is a story of devotion and tenacity that speaks powerfully to our own time.

Illegal bookie. Secret society member. Street hawker. Neo Hock Seng is all these, and more. As Singapore transforms from a kampong to a cosmopolitan city, Hock Seng struggles to make sense of life and eke out a living, even as he finds his old ways and values increasingly challenged.

Lessons learned in the process of designing and implementing one of the longest-running panel data surveys in development economics.

The world's most comprehensive, well documented, and well illustrated book on this subject. With extensive index. 372 photographs and illustrations. Free of charge in digital format on Google Books.