The Best of the Best American Science Writing

Honoring the 10th anniversary of Ecco’s acclaimed Best American Science Writing series, here is Best of the Best of American Science Writing.

What happens when the decade's greatest science writers are asked to curate their own legacy? The Best of the Best American Science Writing is the answer — an anthology of anthologies, gathering ten distinguished editors and asking each one a deceptively simple question: of everything you championed, what two pieces would you bring to the table?

The result is a collection that reveals as much about the choosers as the chosen. James Gleick, whose Chaos redefined how we understand complexity, selected pieces that pull medicine's hidden failures into the light. Oliver Sacks, the incomparable neurologist-poet, chose writing as tender and precise as his own. Atul Gawande, Natalie Angier, Sylvia Nasar, Timothy Ferris — each editor's two picks become a kind of intellectual self-portrait.

From the operating theater to the cosmos, from the politics of dietary fat to the inner life of a parrot, these twenty pieces represent a decade of fearless, essential science writing. With an introduction by Jerome Groopman, The Best of the Best American Science Writing is not just a survey of our times — it is an argument for why science writing matters.

Jesse Cohen is a writer and freelance editor. He lives in New York City.