Nature review of Martians

by Eszter Hargittai on November 30, 2006

Following up on my earlier post about the difference in the marketing and subsequent sales of two similar books, here is a bit of an update. The current (Nov 30, 2006) issue of Nature has a review* of my father István Hargittai’s book The Martians of Science. Likely as a result, the book is now ranked #87,665 on Amazon.com and #33,109 on Amazon UK. Earlier today it was even higher (#56,649 in the US, #16,279 in the UK), but I didn’t have time to blog until now. This is a much better figure than over one million, which it was at some point recently. Of course, the change could well be due to no more than one or two purchases. I’m not sure why it is always higher on Amazon UK, perhaps Amazon lists fewer books on that site.

[*] Nature requires subscription. Here is a screenshot of the review.

{ 4 comments }

1

otto 12.01.06 at 9:35 am

Well, what does the review say?

2

Jacob Christensen 12.01.06 at 11:28 am

Actually, the review – at least as I read it – doesn’t say too much about the book but concentrates on our Martian friends and their stories.

The closing paragraph is the closest we get:

This is an important story that needs to be told, and Hargittai tells it well, although I would liked to have learnt more about the martians’ creativity. Their politics aside, they were brilliant thinkers who were able to spot connections among apparently unconnected disciplines and thus identify fundamental problems — and then solve them.

3

Rich B. 12.02.06 at 12:04 am

More importantly, are they White Martians or Green Martians?

4

John Quiggin 12.02.06 at 2:08 am

It’s a good review, I think, and nice to see the book selling more as a result.

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