Royal Society Book Prize

source: http://royalsociety.org/bookspage.asp?id=8563 via http://richarddawkins.net/article,3911,n,n

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2009 Prize

The 2009 Royal Society Prize for Science Books celebrate the best of 2008's new popular science writing for a general (adult) readership. The winner will be awarded £10,000. The authors of each shortlisted book will receive £1000.

The Royal Society is grateful to the Beecroft Trust for supporting the 2009 Prizes.

Key dates

• Longlist announced 26 May 2009
• The shortlist will be announced on 25 June 2009
• The winner will be announced on 15 September 2009

The longlist

From all the entries received, the judges selected first a longlist of thirteen books. From this longlist they will select a shortlist of six books, and then the winner.

• Bad science by Ben Goldacre, published by Fourth Estate ISBN: 9780007240197
• Decoding the heavens: Solving the mystery of the world's first computer by Jo Marchant, published by William Heinemann ISBN: 9780099519768
• Ice, mud and blood: Lessons from climates past by Chris Turney, published by Palgrave Macmillan ISBN: 9780230553828
• Living with Enza: The forgotten story of Britain and the great flu pandemic of 1918 by Mark Honigsbaum, published by Palgrave Macmillan ISBN: 9780230217744
• Microcosm: E. coli and the new science of life by Carl Zimmer, published by William Heinemann ISBN: 9780434016242
• Physics for future presidents: The science behind the headlines by Richard A Muller, published by WW Norton ISBN: 9780393066272
• Quantum: Einstein. Bohr and the great debate about the nature of reality by Manjit Kumar, published by Icon Books ISBN: 9781848310353
• Strange fruit: Why both sides are wrong in the race debate by Kenan Malik, published by Oneworld Publications ISBN: 978 185168 665 0
• The age of wonder: How the Romantic generation discovered the beauty and terror of scienceby Richard Holmes, published by HARPERPRESS ISBN: 9780007149520
• The drunkard's walk: How randomness rules our lives by Leonard Mlodinow, published by Allen Lane, Penguin Press ISBN: 9780141026473
• The universe in a mirror : The saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the visionaries who built it by Robert Zimmerman, published by Princeton University Press ISBN: 9780691132976
• What the nose knows: The science of scent in everyday life by Avery Gilbert, published by Crown Publishers ISBN: 9781400082346
• Your inner fish: The amazing discovery of our 375-million-year-old ancestor by Neil Shubin, published by Allen Lane, Penguin Press ISBN: 9780141027586

On announcing the longlist, Professor Sir Tim Hunt FRS, Chair of the judges said: "We were surprised and delighted at the quality of books and the diversity of subjects, and greatly enjoyed reading and discussing them. In the end we found it impossible to whittle it down to the traditional long-list of twelve, going instead for a baker's dozen fascinating and diverse potential winners. Choosing a shortlist, let alone awarding the prize, is a daunting prospect."

The judges

The judges on the judging panel are: Sir Tim Hunt FRS, Cancer Research UK and Nobel laureate (Chair); Dr Maggie Aderin-Pocock, space scientist at Astrium Ltd, STFC Fellow of University College London and Founder and MD of Science Innovation Ltd; Dr Phillip Ball, author; Deborah Cohen, Editor, BBC Radio Science Unit; Danny Wallace, author, comedian and presenter.

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