The Monk in the Garden, by Robin Marantz Henig (review)

The best thing I can say about this book is that I found it disappointing. Though put forward as a biography, in some places, like the extensive paragraphs on Mendel's (non)relationship with Darwin, it reads more like historical fiction. Many times, after reading page upon page of anecdotes, we are told that it couldn't have happened that way after all (but imagine if it had!) and I found myself wishing for the last 10, 30, even 60 minutes of my time back. Even after finishing the book I find it difficult to decide whether Henig admires Mendel or disdains him, which isn't altogether hard to understand since some of the scientific community is divided on this as well, but I kind of wonder why she titled the book so exclusively around Mendel when she spent so much of it either referring to him in the diminutive or talking about other great names from science altogether. In fact, the parts I valued most from this book were the tales about those other scientists, many of whom I knew less about than Mendel. I read this book for my library non-fiction book club (which meets next Tuesday) and I am interested to hear what others have to say about it, so maybe I'll come back and update then.

Book 17 on my way to 52