Julia W. reviewed Heartbreaking, wonderful! on 11/15/2008 + 32 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

The six short stories and title named novella are not science fiction, but fiction about science. The first story, 'The Behavior of Hawkweeds,' I found because of a lesson plan on the internet, is about Gregor Mendel, the scientist who stole his work on hawkweeds, and the third scientist who re-discovered Mendel's work. It's also about a retired contemporary professor whose field of genetics has gone past him, and his wife, whose grandfather knew Mendel. 'Ship Fever' is about a young and idealistic Canadian doctor trained in Paris, who goes to an island where the Canadian government is isolating starving Irish immigrants from the Great Hunger who are dying of typhus. There's another story about Linneaus in here and another one where he is offstage, English women are trying to get a way to study with him, but an important part. These are beautiful lonely, sad stories.

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