LET THERE BE LIFE – by Roger Gosden
The authorized biography of IVF pioneer Robert Edwards is a compelling account of how he led a medical and social revolution by making babies in ‘test-tubes’. Prevailing against immense opposition when human embryology was new in science after treatment as mysterious and sacrosanct territory, he was the champion of people with infertility, and now millions more owe their existence to assisted reproductive technologies. An improbable hero of science, he was the son of a coal miner who almost failed his first university degree, but the gritty Yorkshireman rode a roller-coaster of emotions and obstacles to a breakthrough for which he was rewarded with a Nobel Prize and knighthood. After nurturing the first IVF babies with colleagues Patrick Steptoe and Jean Purdy, he became an entrepreneurial clinic director and scientific publisher, but, alas, never received so much acclaim for the foundations of embryo stem cell science and embryo screening for heritable diseases.
A BIOLOGIST IN PARADISE – by Roger Gosden
The author celebrates a love of nature and science in this collection of 40 essays and memoirs. They reveal deep curiosity about biology, including our fellow creatures, and his concern for planetary and human health. Not a science book for scientists nor a nature book for naturalists, it is for anyone who shares those cares, not only for information but also contemplation. The stories are seasoned with humor and quotations from favorite writers and poets. The author cast away his academic hat to grasp the freedom of writing from the heart and hopefully in our anxious age.