Nature’s Building Blocks: An A-Z guide to the elements by John Emsley,
Oxford University Press, £18.99, ISBN 0198503415
DOES the thought of a re-usable laxative appal you? Your ancestors weren’t
put off. Pills of antimony metal were sold in the Middle Ages: of course, they
went straight through. And forget the stories about the royals being
blue-blooded. Spiders, octopuses, snails and oysters are the true blue
bloods—because their blood contains copper instead of iron.
John Emsley bills these memorable tales as “elements of surprise”, adding an
intriguing new slant to the periodic table in his A-Z guide to the elements.
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In Nature’s Building Blocks he does an admirable job of organising
masses of material about the 118 (or so) chemical elements. We learn about each
element’s history, its medical and biological uses, its economic, political and
environmental impact and last—but not least—those “elements of
surprise”. Did you know that the gold in the sea is worth $1500 trillion,
and that Nobel prizewinner Fritz Haber got involved in a crazy scheme to extract
it to pay off Germany’s debts after the First World War? Or that gallium is the
only metal that melts in your hand?
This fascinating book should also appeal to anyone who has even a passing
interest in chemistry—although the rather formal A-Z layout may be
off-putting. And at times Emsley’s cheery style lapses into a disturbing
pedantry. For instance, do we really need to be told how to pronounce “carbon”?
(It’s kar-bon, if you must know.) But it’ll be deeply useful for both teachers
and students of chemistry, at almost any level.
