Vacant Lot Plants (Destinations in Science) Book

Wow. Alternate titles he could have used: Vendetta: Righting All Those Wrongs. Venter used this book to get back at anyone who ever did anything wrong to him or doubted him or didn't support him or undercut him or or or. Then it becomes Toot Toot!: Blowing My Own Horn, because when he isn't getting back at anyone he's letting us know what a superior individual he is, ain't he grand! Even his genome is special. What was left of the book was dry science. Yes, this is an autobiography, he's writing about his life, but the tone is so self-serving and superior it made me roll my eyes. Yes, this is about mapping the human genome, there's going to be science, but I just listened to Bill Bryson who made science FASCINATING, so my standards were too high for Venter. But I'm such a glutton -- can't stop reading a book unless it is so bad it is making my eyes bleed -- so I listened to the whole damn thing. I came pretty close to putting this aside, but by then I'd already invested so much time in the story I decided to trudge on, rolling my eyes and snorting all the way.