An occasional feature, "Law Library Staff Recommend..." highlights books that Law Library staff members have read for enjoyment and now recommend that others consider for inclusion on their own reading lists. If you have any comments or questions about any of the titles presented in this feature, feel free to email lawlib@umn.edu or stop by the library.
Today's book is The Emperor of Scent: A Story of Perfume, Obsession, and the Last Mystery of the Senses by Chandler Burr (Random House, 2003).
Even if you're not interested in perfume, this book will grab your attention. It chronicles the efforts of Luca Turin, a biophysicist, to construct and defend a theory of how humans perceive smells. A major plot thread is Turin's submission of an article to the journal Nature, and the political, turf-warfare peer review process he endures. Chandler Burr makes the science accessible, explaining how Turin's experiments refuted the prevailing shape theory of smell (i.e., that humans recognize molecules by their shape). Anyone with illusions about the purity of science should read this book.
