Fearsome Fauna: A Field Guide to the Creatures That Live in You

Hypochondriacs beware-- would you believe the nastiest creatures in the known universe live inside our bodies? Not content to just find a home and produce offspring in our internal space, parasites will drink our blood, eat our cells, and infest our muscles. There is very little that can be said in their favor, with perhaps one exception-- they are truly fascinating!

Fearsome Fauna is a wickedly amusing and startlingly informative look into the secret world of these fascinating creatures. Perhaps the greatest biological success story of all time (there are more kinds of parasites than insects), parasites have found homes in the vast majority of people on earth and have learned to live in their environment without destroying it (usually). For readers who would like to meet these hardworking beasts-- or learn how to avoid them-- Fearsome Fauna tells you everything you always wanted to know about parasites but were too disgusted or terrified to ask.

Roger M. Knutson is professor emeritus of biology at Luther College in Iowa. He is author of the now-classic Flattened Fauna: A Field Guide to Common Animals of Roads, Streets, and Highways and Furtive Fauna: A Field Guide to the Creatures Who Live on You.