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The Incredible Unlikeliness of Being
- Evolution and the Making of Us
- Narrated by: Dr Alice Roberts
- Length: 11 hrs and 15 mins
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Tamed
- Ten Species That Changed Our World
- By: Alice Roberts
- Narrated by: Alice Roberts
- Length: 13 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Random House presents the audiobook edition of Tamed, written and read by Alice Roberts. The extraordinary story of the species that became our allies. For hundreds of thousands of years, our ancestors depended on wild plants and animals for survival. They were hunter-gatherers, consummate foraging experts, taking the world as they found it. Then a revolution occurred - our ancestors' interaction with other species changed.
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Fascinating.
- By Bear Paintain on 27-11-2019
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Buried
- An Alternative History of the First Millennium in Britain
- By: Alice Roberts
- Narrated by: Alice Roberts
- Length: 10 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Funerary rituals show us what people thought about mortality; how they felt about loss; what they believed came next. From Roman cremations and graveside feasts, to deviant burials with heads rearranged, from richly furnished Anglo Saxon graves to the first Christian burial grounds in Wales, Buried provides an alternative history of the first millennium in Britain.
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Changed the way I thought!
- By Nicholas J. Morley on 28-10-2023
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Foreign Bodies
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- By: Simon Schama
- Narrated by: Simon Schama
- Length: 16 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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With the devastating effects of Covid-19 still rattling the foundations of our global civilization, we live in unprecedented times – or so we might think. But pandemics have been a constant presence throughout human history, as humans and disease live side by side. Over the centuries, our ability to react to these sweeping killers has evolved, most notably through the development of vaccines.
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Essential listening
- By Jude Rae on 27-09-2023
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Ancestors
- A Prehistory of Britain in Seven Burials
- By: Alice Roberts
- Narrated by: Alice Roberts
- Length: 13 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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We often think of Britain springing from nowhere with the arrival of the Romans. But in Ancestors, pre-eminent archaeologist, broadcaster and academic Professor Alice Roberts explores what we can learn about the very earliest Britons – from their burial sites. Although we have very little evidence of what life was like in prehistorical times, here their stories are told through the bones and funerary offerings left behind, preserved in the ground for thousands of years.
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Strong start, then veered off course
- By Sonya on 29-09-2021
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Otherlands
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- Narrated by: Adetomiwa Edun
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What would it be like to visit the ancient landscapes of the past? To experience the Jurassic or Cambrian worlds, to wander among these other lands, as creatures extinct for millions of years roam? In this mesmerizing debut, award-winning palaeontologist Thomas Halliday gives us a breath-taking up-close encounter with worlds that are normally unimaginably distant.
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Time travel
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The World Before Us
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- By: Tom Higham
- Narrated by: John Sackville
- Length: 9 hrs and 4 mins
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Fifty thousand years ago, we were not the only species of human in the world. There were at least four others, including the Neanderthals, Homo floresiensis, Homo luzonesis and the Denisovans. At the forefront of the latter's ground-breaking discovery was Oxford Professor Tom Higham. In The World Before Us, he explains the scientific and technological advancements.
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Brilliant book beautifully narrated
- By Anonymous User on 12-03-2023
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Tamed
- Ten Species That Changed Our World
- By: Alice Roberts
- Narrated by: Alice Roberts
- Length: 13 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Random House presents the audiobook edition of Tamed, written and read by Alice Roberts. The extraordinary story of the species that became our allies. For hundreds of thousands of years, our ancestors depended on wild plants and animals for survival. They were hunter-gatherers, consummate foraging experts, taking the world as they found it. Then a revolution occurred - our ancestors' interaction with other species changed.
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Fascinating.
- By Bear Paintain on 27-11-2019
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Buried
- An Alternative History of the First Millennium in Britain
- By: Alice Roberts
- Narrated by: Alice Roberts
- Length: 10 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Funerary rituals show us what people thought about mortality; how they felt about loss; what they believed came next. From Roman cremations and graveside feasts, to deviant burials with heads rearranged, from richly furnished Anglo Saxon graves to the first Christian burial grounds in Wales, Buried provides an alternative history of the first millennium in Britain.
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Changed the way I thought!
- By Nicholas J. Morley on 28-10-2023
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Foreign Bodies
- Pandemics, Vaccines and the Health of Nations
- By: Simon Schama
- Narrated by: Simon Schama
- Length: 16 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
With the devastating effects of Covid-19 still rattling the foundations of our global civilization, we live in unprecedented times – or so we might think. But pandemics have been a constant presence throughout human history, as humans and disease live side by side. Over the centuries, our ability to react to these sweeping killers has evolved, most notably through the development of vaccines.
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Essential listening
- By Jude Rae on 27-09-2023
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Ancestors
- A Prehistory of Britain in Seven Burials
- By: Alice Roberts
- Narrated by: Alice Roberts
- Length: 13 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
We often think of Britain springing from nowhere with the arrival of the Romans. But in Ancestors, pre-eminent archaeologist, broadcaster and academic Professor Alice Roberts explores what we can learn about the very earliest Britons – from their burial sites. Although we have very little evidence of what life was like in prehistorical times, here their stories are told through the bones and funerary offerings left behind, preserved in the ground for thousands of years.
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Strong start, then veered off course
- By Sonya on 29-09-2021
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Otherlands
- A World in the Making
- By: Thomas Halliday
- Narrated by: Adetomiwa Edun
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
What would it be like to visit the ancient landscapes of the past? To experience the Jurassic or Cambrian worlds, to wander among these other lands, as creatures extinct for millions of years roam? In this mesmerizing debut, award-winning palaeontologist Thomas Halliday gives us a breath-taking up-close encounter with worlds that are normally unimaginably distant.
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Time travel
- By Bronte on 14-06-2023
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The World Before Us
- How Science Is Revealing a New Story of Our Human Origins
- By: Tom Higham
- Narrated by: John Sackville
- Length: 9 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Fifty thousand years ago, we were not the only species of human in the world. There were at least four others, including the Neanderthals, Homo floresiensis, Homo luzonesis and the Denisovans. At the forefront of the latter's ground-breaking discovery was Oxford Professor Tom Higham. In The World Before Us, he explains the scientific and technological advancements.
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Brilliant book beautifully narrated
- By Anonymous User on 12-03-2023
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A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived
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This is a story about you. It is the history of who you are and how you came to be. It is unique to you, as it is for every one of the 100 billion modern humans who has ever drawn breath. But it is also our collective story, because in each of our genomes we carry the history of the whole of our species.
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great book
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In The Earth Transformed, ground-breaking historian Peter Frankopan shows that engagement with the natural world and with climatic change and their effects on us are not new: exploring, for instance, the development of religion and language and their relationships with the environment; tracing how growing demands for harvests resulted in the increased shipment of enslaved peoples; scrutinising how the desire to centralise agricultural surplus formed the origins of the bureaucratic state; and seeing how efforts to understand and manipulate the weather have a long history.
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Badly read
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Early Humans: Ice, Stone, and Survival
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In 20 captivating lectures, Professor Suzanne Pilaar Birch shares her expertise and passion for discovery as she peels back the years to expose the emergence and lives of early humans. You will learn about their environmental challenges, the methods they used to meet their basic needs, cultural development, and the fascinating advances in our own technologies that have allowed us to take their few physical remains and develop a much fuller picture.
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Mesmerising
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Rutherford and Fry’s Complete Guide to Absolutely Everything
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In the Rutherford and Fry's comprehensive guidebook, they tell the complete story of the universe and absolutely everything in it - skipping over some of the boring parts. It's a celebration of the weirdness of the cosmos, the strangeness of humans and the very fact that amid all the mess, we can somehow make sense of life.
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Get the book now. Don’t waste any time deciding.
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Kindred
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In Kindred, Neanderthal expert Becky Wragg Sykes shoves aside the cliché of the shivering ragged figure in an icy wasteland and reveals the Neanderthal you don’t know, who lived across vast and diverse tracts of Eurasia and survived through hundreds of thousands of years of massive climate change. Using a thematic rather than chronological approach, this book will shed new light on where they lived, what they ate and the increasingly complex Neanderthal culture that is being discovered.
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Amazing
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Pax: War and Peace in Rome's Golden Age
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Pax is the third in a trilogy of books narrating the history of the Roman Empire. The series that began with Rubicon, and continued with Dynasty, now arrives at the period which marks the apogée of the pax Romana. It provides a portrait of the ancient world's ultimate superpower at war and at peace; from the gilded capital to the barbarous realms beyond the frontier; from emperors to slaves.
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Could not put it down
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Tuuli is a prehistoric girl, travelling with her tribe through the seasons – making camp, hunting for food and protecting themselves against the many hazards that the climate throws at them. Tuuli knows there’s a bigger world out there, and when she spots a strange boy lurking outside their camp, she realises that he might hold the adventure she is looking for. He is a Neanderthal, sent by his tribe to find safer ground and as he and Tuuli strike up an unlikely friendship, they set out on a journey that will impact the rest of human history.
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Hard to put down
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'A wonderful idea, gloriously put into practice. Greg Jenner as is witty as he is knowledgeable.' (Tom Holland) 'Delightful, surprising and hilarious, this is a fascinating history of the everyday objects and inventions we take for granted.' (Lauren Laverne) Every day, from the moment our alarm clock wakes us in the morning until our head hits our pillow at night, we all take part in rituals that are millennia old.
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Pretty lame esp the review rules.
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The Trials of Life
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This is the third and last of Sir David’s great natural history books based on his TV series and completes his survey of the animal world that began with Life on Earth and continues with Living Planet. In Life on Earth, Sir David showed how each group of animals evolved. In Living Planet he looked at the way they have adapted to the whole range of habitats in which they live. Now, in Trials of Life, he completes the story by revealing how animals behave – and why.
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amazing
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Ancient Writing and the History of the Alphabet
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Embark on a journey to the very beginning of writing as a tool of language and see how the many threads of history and linguistics came together to create the alphabet that forms the foundation of English writing. Your guide is Professor John McWhorter of Columbia University and in the 16 lectures of Ancient Writing and the History of the Alphabet, he will help you navigate the complex linguistic and cultural history behind one of our most crucial tools of communication.
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Unruly
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- Narrated by: David Mitchell
- Length: 11 hrs and 39 mins
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In Unruly, David Mitchell explores how early England's monarchs, while acting as feared rulers firmly guiding their subjects' destinies, were in reality a bunch of lucky sods who were mostly as silly and weird in real life as they appear to us today in their portraits.
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A fun history of england
- By Anonymous User on 01-12-2023
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Being Human
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- By: Lewis Dartnell
- Narrated by: John Sackville
- Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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We are a wonder of evolution. Powerful yet dextrous, instinctive yet thoughtful, we are expert communicators and innovators. Our exceptional abilities have created the civilisation we know today. But we're also deeply flawed. Our bodies break, choke and fail, whether we're kings or peasants. Diseases thwart our boldest plans. Our psychological biases have been at the root of terrible decisions in both war and peacetime. This extraordinary contradiction is the essence of what it means to be human - the sum total of our frailties and our faculties.
Publisher's Summary
The presenter of the BBC's The Incredible Human Journey gives us a new and highly accessible look at our own bodies and into the past to uncover the evolutionary secrets hidden in all of us.
Shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize.
Alice Roberts takes you on the most incredible journey, revealing your path from a single cell to a complex embryo to a living, breathing, thinking person. It's a story that connects us with our distant ancestors and an extraordinary, unlikely chain of events that shaped human development and left a mark on all of us.
Alice Roberts uses the latest research to uncover the evolutionary history hidden in all of us, from the secrets found only in our embryos and genes - including why as embryos we have what look like gills - to those visible in your anatomy. This is a tale of discovery, exploring why and how we have developed as we have. This is your story, told as never before.
Critic Reviews
"From your brain to your fingertips, you emerge from her book entertained and with a deeper understanding of yourself." (Richard Dawkins)
"A masterful account of why our bodies are the way they are...this book really shines.... Roberts's lightness of touch is joyous, and celebratory." (Observer)
"Witty, personal and above all informed by passion and deep knowledge, this is the story of you, not just from conception onwards but from the millions of years of evolution that have shaped the way we are today." (Adam Rutherford)
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What listeners say about The Incredible Unlikeliness of Being
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Nicholas J. Morley
- 24-10-2023
Fascinating
Really enjoyed listening learnt heaps. Looking forward to listening again to reinforce and find out what I missed!
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- Bill McPherson
- 18-10-2023
Facts, beautifully packaged and understood 😌
I thoroughly enjoyed Alice reading to me on my beach walks.
Cleared away many cobwebs
Excellent 👍
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- Bondi Amazon Customer
- 10-05-2023
Easy listening makes for easy learning
Whilst the evolutionary story told is not in itself new, Roberts smoothly delivers a readily understood and entertaining narrative. I can’t believe how quickly the time past whilst immersed in this wonderful audiobook.
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- Amazon Customer
- 13-03-2023
Excellent
A thoroughly entertaining and informative book, just as you’d expect from Dr Alice Roberts. Well worth listening.
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- Kym Angrave
- 13-03-2023
Another great Alice Roberts book
Once again ive thoroughly enjoyed listening to Professor Alice Roberts narrate this book, fascinating look into the human body and how we have come to be
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- DR GREGORY N LOW
- 11-06-2023
Just superb
Whenever I listen to one of Alice's presentations, I'm struck by how much I've learned, how much more I now realise that I don't know, and by her extraordinary abilities. This book is so much more than I could have imagined. I'm glad Alice read it herself. It is clear and understandable. I saw one comment saying they didn't understand her accent well. I could not disagree with that comment more.
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- Mark
- 15-04-2023
Audio is lacking.
I'm enjoying this book's subject matter. Embryology is fascinating. The narrator speaks with a heavy British accent complete with all the different pronunciations and that coupled with a great deal of new biological terms has me constantly trying to understand her. The audio quality is just not there. Audible tells me that the quality of all the books is now the same and they provide the best on each purchase.
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- toby oxford
- 29-03-2023
Fascinating story of Us
This was another fantastic book from Alice, and great that she was the narrator too as I find it adds something extra to the reading. The story of our development as humans and the evolution that got us to where we are today never ceases to amaze. Alice has a way of making this complicated process very enjoyable to listen to and describes processes and developments in scientific understanding easy to relate to and remember. I enjoyed this book a great deal and look forward to the next one.
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- veyza
- 26-03-2023
Ambitious and exhaustive
This book summarizes a huge amount of material as it takes us on an often fascinating journey through the human body and its development both anatomically and evolutionarily. It is a little dry in places near the start but it definitely rewards perseverance.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Mrs. Jasmine Simeone
- 18-03-2023
Astonishing, clear account
I am completely in awe of Alice Roberts for producing such a clear and concise account of hitherto unknown accounts of what we are and how we came to be. I am pleased that she does not put definitive spin on the development of man in the context of other beings but instead makes it clear that what we know can change at any time. Fascinating and well worth reading!
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1 person found this helpful
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- Salbal
- 07-09-2023
Brilliant book
So enjoyed listening to this fascinating account of how human beings came to be. And Alice Roberts is a very good narrator. Might have to buy the print copy as well!
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- Kevin B.
- 06-08-2023
Fascinating
Completely fascinating book. The level of detail the author goes into is incredible, she has a wonderful way of making the mind blowing reality of our evolution very simple understandable.
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- Jacimac
- 29-05-2023
Excellent scientific story plainly & simply explained
From palaeontology to detailed and fascinating description of current human embryonic evolution, this is such an easy to read book with many surprising facts clearly and concisely explained by Alice Roberts herself.
Highly recommended.
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- Prof
- 06-05-2023
Interesting but a bit descriptive
I’ve loved Alice’s other books and this is good too with a sprinkle of fascinating insights on the connection our DNA and body parts with those found in other animals. However large parts of the book are descriptions of human body parts which feels a bit like someone talking you through a picture without showing the picture
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- Anonymous User
- 29-04-2023
good listen
very good and well read , I learnt a lot about being me and how we all got here.
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