prize books?

The Royal Society's judges (no longer Aventis sponsored) are casting their net pretty wide for the adult prize this year. The longlist of 12 ranges from old hands like Paul Davies and the thrice shortlisted Matt Ridley to first-time author Henry Nicholls - whose Lonesome George has been talked about here already. There's a Rough Guide in there too, which I like as I'm about to publish one myself. And, ahem, The Science of Doctor Who. How do they compare them, I wonder?

Full list here.

There's also a link there to various science and literary celebs' nominations for favourite reading, which throw up some good old titles - Hardy's Mathematician's Apology, Freeman Dyson, Sagan, Bronowski and J. B. S Haldane, as well as a few contemporaries. OUP are getting ready to publish a new (i.e. old!) collection of Haldane's classic essays, incidentally.

Off to a workshop at LSE on "how facts travel" next week, so may actually have some new things to say then