I am not sure I could like a book where the main character is so loathsome ... yeah Craig ... you are a creepy person ... you make scientists seem, ummmmm... mad, yeah mad. How in the world did you get to be so self-important? You want to know why so much government money is wasted ... look no further ... it goes to propping up the huge egos of Venter and his ilk. Sad, sad, sad. Did I learn anything from this book? yes. Did I really want to know? No.

I liked it. Lots of information I didn't know told well. The story moves along quickly but doesn't seem to leave anything out. It never bogs down though. Recommended.

Though he might be admired for his lofty scientific goals, Venter is not a well-liked man. At the time in question, the government called him "Darth Vader." Shreeve merely describes him both as "an inspiration" and an "opportunistic maniac." Genome War pays close attention to this ego-driven biologist. Despite his facade, he comes across as a complex man with deep insecurities. Shreeve, who gained full access to Celera, handles technical information well and reveals the inner bowels of the company. We see the human genome war exclusively from Celera's battle lines, but this perspective (and Venter's often flat portrayal) barely detract from a compelling story about the search for our genetic make-up. To be continued, for sure, with battle lines possibly redrawn.

This is an excerpt from a review published in Bookmarks magazine.

This book offers a plausible, journalistic account of the mapping of the human genome: plausible in the sense that the motives, machinations, and manipulations ring true enough; journalistic in the sense that vivid personalities are very much to the fore, and that deeper issues are more alluded to than thoroughly explored. Shreeve clearly talked to people on the government side of things, but spent the bulk of his time with those at Celera. One result of this is that while the government/academic perspective of free access to data is mentioned, the real and profound ethical questions about the implications of private ownership of such knowledge go unexplored.

For some of the anecdotes, Shreeve the embedded journalist was clearly present, for others not. The line of demarcation is not as clear as I would have liked.

With the caveats mentioned, however, Shreeve has created an interesting and entertaining narrative of the ways that personalities shape pursuit of knowledge. While big egos distort the quest for answers to big questions, Shreeve seems to argue that without big egos, the questions would never be answered at all.

An interesting subject and not a bad book but you need a spread-sheet to keep track of the dozens of characters, the entities they work for or are members of, how those entities themselves are related, what their agendas were ... I eventually gave up on trying to keep it all straight.
Past the half-way point I began to feel it was getting rather repetitive and struggled to keep going but I did because I wanted to see the main "plot" resolved.

An outstanding book - proves once again that truth can be stranger than fiction. What a cast of characters and the author does an excellent job of describing them. The author is also very good at using metaphors and analogies to explain the sometimes complex scientific and technological aspects of unraveling the mysteries of the genome.

Very interesting story both from a scientific and business standpoint, and very well written. This is a prime example of how big science can involve and generate big business. The main figure in the story is a highly unusual man named Craig Venter. For a scientist he has the most unusual background you can possibly imagine, which adds considerably to the interest of the story.

Good book. Certainly a good telling of the events from inside the minds of those who participated. Due to some access issues it was a little one sided, but the author tells why and is very up front about it. Would recommend to anyone who was interested in how they came to map the genome. So sad that the darker aspects of humanity (greed, jealousy, pride) interfered so much with it. It could have been done faster and possibly better if everyone had been able to play nice. A lesson for future endeavors, but one we have not yet learned in our thousands of years of recorded history.

I read /The Genome War: How Craig Venter Tried to Capture the Code of Life and Save the World/, by James Shreeve.

https://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/15/bo...

The genome and genetics are a fascinating world.

I knew Venter's story already, but learned some additional details in Shreeve's book.

Een illustratie van hoe competitie in wetenschap in zijn werk gaat.

bad translation

This was a fascinating book. I only gave it three stars for what might be a lack in me: I don't feel I learned much more about the science than before reading the book. It is a fascinating story. Like any story it has characters that are all too human in the poor sense of the word. Inflated egos were all over the place, hindering the actual science. Spite came into play more than a few times as well. Venter himself was guilty of some of this as well. The author did not try to pretty him up, even if the bias of the book was in his favor. The author had asked the Human Genome Project for access while the story was developing and was refused. Later when he tried to get the info through a freedom of information act, it came heavily blackened out. The author said: "...to this day I remain perplexed why an enterprise that prided itself on global access tp its genomic treasures should be so secretive about how those treasures were obtained." I suspect this is what led to an account that is biased towards Venter. On the other hand, how could it not, when only one side was providing access to the information? It is pretty ironic that the private business, accused of keeping scientific information hidden for their own profit was the side that was open to this author being involved pretty much every step of the way. The government funded "open" project was the one refusing any access to the story.

Ultimately it is a cautionary tale that pure science is never completely pure. There is always going to be motivation based on ego and who claims the academic fame in addition to love of the science itself. That may not show up on the genome but it is a basic enough human trait to make you wonder if there isn't a gene coding for that somewhere!