5 Books Scientific American Recommends for August

Turn the Page on Summer: August’s Essential Book Picks

By Brianne Kane edited by Andrea Gawrylewski

The dog days of summer have been nipping at our heels this August: the humidity has been oppressive, the vacations not quite long enough, and the prospect of going into autumn is both comforting and dreadful. Summer reading may be ending soon, but Scientific American still has compelling science books to recommend before “sweater weather” sets in. This August we read about regenerating human body parts and the future of artificial intelligence, learned about the history of our planet and the solar system as interpreted through meteorites and layers of Earth and spent some time exploring the hellscape known as graduate school. What are you reading to close out the summer? Keep an eye out for more book inspiration from Scientific American later this year.

Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI
by Karen Hao
Penguin Press, May 2025

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History is filled with tales of the rise and fall of empires. Such political entities, governed by a singular unelected leader, drag millions of people along for the ride, often to the benefit of only a small ruling class (and the exploitation of the masses). In Empire of AI, journalist Karen Hao makes a bold but simple claim: the AI companies intricately woven into our digital lives are de facto empires, and it takes keen senses to sort their powerful leaders’ self-aggrandizing promises from the realistic implications of the technology. Seemingly overnight every website or app has developed its own AI tool, making this technology suddenly unavoidable, though it is also unquestionably important and likely misunderstood. Hao, a former AI editor for MIT Technology Review and former foreign correspondent with the Wall Street Journal, brings robust boots-on-the-ground-style journalism to this extensive book—with more than 65 pages of notes and sources. It’s an extraordinary example of nonfiction, both beautifully written and deeply researched. And it takes an uncompromising stance on the global impacts of AI and the explosion of money and power behind the technology. —Brianne Kane

The Meteorites: Encounters with Outer Space and Deep Time
by Helen Gordon
Profile Books, June 2025

Billion-year-old rocks filled with tiny microbes from extraterrestrial water could be the key to our understanding of the universe and the origins of life on Earth. While researching and writing her new book The Meteorites, writer Helen Gordon traveled the world to meet an array of meteorite devotees: from the geologists developing a new field of study dubbed “paleo-astronomy”—who examine meteorites that have fallen to Earth (and the microbes they carry) to learn about galactic and solar system formation and the origins of alien life—to the rock lovers who spend their days hunting for and selling, for potentially millions of dollars, the prettiest, weirdest or “youngest” space rocks they can find. The Meteorites is not only an ode to rock collectors but also to anyone intrigued by these sometimes terrifying objects that tumble toward Earth from ancient corners of space. Seeing, or better yet holding, a meteorite is a profound experience, Gordon writes. It would likely be the oldest thing you’d ever touched. And while space feels very much “out there,” she says, “out there is all around us. Landing on our shoulders, falling on our roofs.” —B.K.

Strata: Stories from Deep Time
by Laura Poppick
W. W. Norton, July 2025

The deep history of Earth—over the sheer scale of billions of years, with only the opaque names of eras and epochs to navigate by—can be overwhelming. In Strata, geologist-turned-science-journalist Laura Poppick pushes past this screen by highlighting four pivotal phenomena: air, ice, mud and heat. Each force completely reshaped Earth during a key period of the past—and changed life on the planet as well, allowing different varieties of plants and animals to thrive as circumstances shifted. Throughout the book, she shows what scientists know about our planet’s deep history. She also introduces researchers who are working in the field and in the lab to dig through the layers, or strata, of rock and continue fleshing out the story they tell. She takes the reader a step further, right to those rocks, by sharing her own experiences in the field, from dinosaur digs to Ireland’s emerald-green coast. It’s an emotional, humane book that explores geology in a new way. —Meghan Bartels

Katabasis
by R.F. Kuang
Harper Voyager, August 2025

Graduate school is known for being challenging, but magic graduate school sucks the life right out of you: it involves memorizing ancient spells, selecting the correct enchanted chalk for sketching a pentagram and perfecting your Latin so your spells don’t break the fabric of the universe. In Katabasis, novelist R.F. Kuang dives into the fictional (but oh-so-familiar) hellscape of academia. After their graduate advisor dies under mysterious magical circumstances, graduate students of magic Alice and Peter, both determined to finish their program with honors, decide they must descend into Hell and resurrect their professor so they can defend their dissertations. Like much of her previous work, Kuang excels here with her expansive world-building, clever magic systems and forward-moving plot that keeps you reading into the night. Katabasis cautiously wades into waters not often explored in the “magical school” genre of fantasy novels by depicting sexism and violence enacted by teachers on students. Readers will enjoy smirking at the literary references to Greek mythology, but the heart of the book is the reluctantly close relationship between Alice and Peter: there’s no stronger bond than a trauma bond. —B.K.

Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy
by Mary Roach
W. W. Norton, September 2025

In her latest book, author Mary Roach does what she does best: she selects a squirm-worthy subject (past examples have included cadavers, digestion and copulation) and transforms it into a lively tale of science and the human endeavor. In Replaceable You, Roach trains her talents on the world of organ regeneration and replacement. Along the way, she reveals the beauty of the human body by highlighting how, well, gross it is: humans are filled with mucus, our hair sometimes falls out, and our joints degrade in their sockets. Inspired by “the remarkable and sometimes surreal adaptability—the agreeableness—of the human body” to accept new organs, new tissues or fluids, Roach’s unforgettable sense of adventure flies off every page. Whether holding a beating human heart in her hand or spending a night in an iron lung just to try it out, she is fearless in her firsthand reporting. She even chitchats about the details of surgical vulvoplasty over lunch with a surgeon, awkwardly laughing when the waiter offers their table more Parmesan cheese—the surgeon is ravenous and barely notices. Some organs may be replaceable, but the endlessly endearing and fascinating Mary Roach is not.

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