Talking Death on Earth with Zoologist Jules Howard

I process words for a living. A lot of those words, in peer-reviewed journals or rough first drafts, are not the liveliest of reads. I'm not complaining. It is, after all, how I justify a high-carb diet. A girl's gotta fuel her gray matter. So when a book lands on my desk that's funny and clever but also chock full of science, a book that's a genuine pleasure to read, I get excited. Such was British zoologist Jules Howard's 2014 title, Sex on Earth: A Celebration of Animal Reproduction (excerpted that year in Discover). Howard is back with a new book that tackles another big topic with his mix of insatiable curiosity, serious science and self-deprecating wit. It also happens to be a book right up Dead Things' alley. It's called Death on Earth: Adventures in Evolution and Mortality, but don't judge the book by its title. Okay, it is ...