Customer Reviews

Does Anything Eat Wasps? (New Scientist)

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In 1994, the New Scientist started a column, The last word, devoted to everyday science questions asked by readers, with answers also provided by readers. Originally expected to survive for between one and five years, the column survived way beyond that and as far as I know, it is still going strong. Two books compiled from these columns didn't do much business but the third (this one) was a huge success. Its success prompted a subsequent volume, Why don't penguins feet freeze?, that selects questions and answers from those two unsuccessful volumes and adds questions of more recent origin. A further volume, Do polar bears get lonely?, has also proved hugely successful.

This book consists of eight chapters covering our bodies, plants and animals, domestic science, our universe, our planet, weird weather, troublesome transport and, for questions that don't fit easily into any of those categories, best of the rest.

The question that gives the book its title was presumably prompted by the irritation that wasps cause in the summer months. Apparently, the only answer that the questioner could come up with was very stupid birds, so he asked New Scientist. A variety of answers was supplied and it appears that certain species of birds, frogs, fishes and insects will all eat wasps, given the chance, while badgers sometimes dig up their nests and feed on the larva. This is typical of the book, which usually provides several responses to each question, though occasionally only one, if it is good enough. Some responses are obviously meant to be serious, as they all were regarding the unformatted wasps, but funny responses are given to some questions along with more serious responses.

Another question that particularly grabbed my attention was about snow. The questioner asked why it is sometimes impossible to make a snowball because the snow won't stick together. Two answers are supplied but neither mentions the famous British Rail answer - it's the wrong type of snow. Still, if you read the answers, you'll understand that there really are different types of snow.

The variety of the questions asked and the answers provided is incredible, although I confess that I wouldn't have actually considered asking most of these questions. While this book provides very informative answers, I suspect that you'll have most fun with it if you share it with family and friends.

A wonderful question-and-answer book covering many seemingly simple queries regarding all aspects of science. The questions come from readers of the New Scientist magazine and teams of scientific experts from the world over answer them. What makes the book special is not only the accessibility of the answers but also the basic nature of the enquiries themselves. What's more, the explanations of the answers are never too long to be tedious. Just when your mind starts to wander while reading the answer, it ends. This is a great book for anyone, irrespective of the amount of science they may have had in their background.