Siddhartha Mukherjee. The Gene. An Intimate History. New York: Scribner, 2016. 593 pp. $32.00 cloth (ISBN 978-1-4767-3350-0)

Heredity has always been, in one form or another, at the center of biological research. There is little doubt that the first scientific experimentation took place about fifteen thousand years ago, when humans started breeding plants and animals in order to domesticate them. Today the science of genetics seems to advance at such a pace that even the experts have trouble keeping up with all the developments. Now we are witnessing the expansion of our understanding of this realm of science to levels unimaginable just a few decades ago