a brief history of everyone who ever lived

From Neanderthals to murder, from redheads to race, dead kings to plague, evolution to epigenetics, this is a demystifying and illuminating new portrait of who we are and how we came to be.' In this captivating journey through the expanding landscape of genetics, Adam Rutherford reveals what our genes now tell us about history, and what history tells us about our genes. DNA determines far less than we have been led to believe about us as individuals, but vastly more about us as a species. In fact, as Adam Rutherford explains, our genomes should be read not as instruction manuals, but as epic poems. Since scientists first read the human genome in 2001, it has been subject to all sorts of claims, counterclaims, and myths. But it is also our collective story, because in every one of our genomes we each carry the history of our species births, deaths, disease, war, famine, migration, and a lot of sex. It is unique to you, as it is to each of the 100 billion modern humans who have ever drawn breath. It is the history of who you are and how you came to be. 'An extraordinary adventure.This is a story about you.

'Magisterial, informative and delightful' Peter Frankopan 'A thoroughly entertaining history of Homo sapiens and its DNA in a manner that displays popular science writing at its best' Observer From Neanderthals to murder, from redheads to race, dead kings to plague, evolution to epigenetics, this is a demystifying and illuminating new portrait of who we are and how we came to be. In this captivating journey through the expanding landscape of genetics, Adam Rutherford reveals what our genes now tell us about human history, and what history can now tell us about our genes. But it is also our collective story, because in every one of our genomes we each carry the history of our species - births, deaths, disease, war, famine, migration and a lot of sex.

'A brilliant, authoritative, surprising, captivating introduction to human genetics.

A brief history of everyone who ever lived