Description

**A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2022 and FINANCIAL TIMES BEST BOOK OF 2023**
*Shortlisted for the Royal Society Trivedi Science Book Prize 2023*

From the author of Spillover, the book that predicted the pandemic, Breathless is the story of Covid-19 and its fierce journey through the human population, as seen by the scientists tasked with fighting it.

Bestelling author David Quammen draws on countless interviews with experts, including leading virologists, to take us inside the global race to understand SARS-CoV-2, it’s ever-changing nature and capacity to kill. In doing so, he explains how new viruses emerge when we disrupt ecosystems and suggests why the coronavirus may be here to stay.

By peering over the shoulders of the brilliant scientists leading the chase, Breathless uncovers the warnings from infectious diseases experts that went unheeded; and which clues are the most compelling in the hunt for the virus’ origin.

‘A viral howdunnit that is pacy and unafraid to educate readers’ Observer

‘A luminous, passionate account of the defining crisis of our time’ New York Times

‘A classic…a masterpiece’ Stanley Prusiner, Nobel Prize Winner

‘As close to authoritative history as we have… It reads like a real-time thriller’ Chicago Tribune

Publisher Review

A supernova in among science journalists * Oprah Daily * An expert eye on Covid's past and present [and] a viral howdunnit that is pacy and unafraid to educate readers * Observer * [A] tour de force...A luminous, passionate account of the defining crisis of our time - and the unprecedented international response to it. * The New York Times Book Review * As close to authoritative history - from the virus's origins to vaccines and variants - as we have, told through scientists involved, and the signature ease of Quammen's prose. It reads like a real-time thriller. * Chicago Tribune * Will likely prove to be a classic in the history of science ... a masterpiece * Stanley Prusiner, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine * [An] engrossing, at times breathless, scientific narrative of the COVID-19 * Nature * A frightening and fascinating masterpiece of science reporting that reads like a detective story * Walter Isaacson on Spillover * Fascinating and terrifying, Spillover is a real-life thriller with an outcome that affects us all * Elizabeth Kolbert on Spillover * A tremendous book... this gives you all you need to know and should know. Quammen's research and analysis makes sensationalism unnecessary * Sunday Times on Spillover * Chilling... [A] brilliant, devastating book * Daily Mail on Spillover * Travelling deep into the rainforest with the scientists hoping to identify the next pandemic pathogen, Quammen's book is plotted like a detective thriller * Gaia Vince, Guardian on Spillover * David Quammen might be my favourite living science writer: amiable, erudite, understated, incredibly funny, profoundly humane * New York Magazine on Spillover *