Fascinating and deeply disturbing

This is a manual for the 21st-century citizen, and it succeeds where other big data accounts have failed - it is accessible, refreshingly critical and feels relevant and urgent

Well-written, entertaining and very valuable

O'Neil has become a whistle-blower for the world of Big Data... Her work makes particularly disturbing points about how being on the wrong side of an algorithmic decision can snowball in incredibly destructive ways

Cathy O'Neil has seen Big Data from the inside, and the picture isn't pretty. Weapons of Math Destruction opens the curtain on algorithms that exploit people and distort the truth while posing as neutral mathematical tools. This book is wise, fierce, and desperately necessary

Weapons of Math Destruction is a fantastic, plainspoken call to arms. Cathy O'Neil's book is important precisely because she believes in data science. It's a vital crash course in why we must interrogate the systems around us and demand better

Often we don't even know where to look for those important algorithms, because by definition the most dangerous ones are also the most secretive. That's why the catalogue of case studies in O'Neil's book are so important; she's telling us where to look

In today's world, if you want to change your fate you've got to pray at the altar of the algorithm... As math guru Cathy O'Neil argues in her newest book, these models are just the latest way America's institutions perpetuate bias and prejudice to reward the rich and keep the poor, well, poor. It's a nuanced reminder that big data is only as good as the people wielding it

Not math heavy, but written in an exceedingly accessible, almost literary style; her fascinating case studies of WMDs fit neatly into the genre of dystopian literature. There's a little Philip K. Dick, a little Orwell, a little Kafka in her portrait of powerful bureaucracies ceding control of the most intimate decisions of our lives to hyper-empowered computer models riddled with all of our unresolved, atavistic human biases

O'Neil is an ideal person to write this book... She is one of the strongest voices speaking out for limiting the ways we allow algorithms to influence our lives and against the notion that an algorithm, because it is implemented by an unemotional machine, cannot perpetrate bias or injustice... While Weapons of Math Destruction is full of hard truths and grim statistics, it is also accessible and even entertaining. O'Neil's writing is direct and easy to read - I devoured it in an afternoon

Extraordinary

The moving and remarkable story of one of the greatest ecological discoveries of our time. Writing with humility and passion, Suzanne Simard's unravelling of the secret life of trees is changing the scientific mindset. Finding the Mother Tree is a crucial step towards healing our planet

Few scientists make much impact with their PhD thesis, but, in 1997, Suzanne Simard did just that ... What was then a challenge to orthodox ideas is today widely accepted

Finding the Mother Tree is a rare and moving book - part charming memoir, part crash course in forest ecology. And yet, it manages to be about the things that matter most: the ways we care for each other, fail each other and listen to each other. After the last year and a half, its lessons about motherhood, connection and the natural world are more timely than ever

Few researchers have had the pop culture impact of Suzanne Simard

The interplay of personal narrative, scientific insights and the amazing revelations about the life of the forest make a compelling story... These are stories that the world needs to hear

Suzanne Simard has a completely beguiling way of writing. I love how she combines brilliant scientific explanation with emotion and feeling

Suzanne Simard is a total legend - someone who transformed the world in the way of James Lovelock, or Lynn Margulis

Revolutionary on both the scientific and the spiritual level. It is so extraordinary that it is, frankly, hard to believe - until you see the data, the science, the rigour, and the many independent affirmations of her findings... Simard is one of [Nature's] most insightful and eloquent translators

How tech companies conquered the world and how their thirst for endless growth shapes the way they operate . . . Heralds an eventful, if rather alarming, new phase in human history.

Amazing facts . . . I highly recommend it.

George Monbiot is one of the most fearless and important voices in the global climate movement today

I used to look up to the stars for thoughts of infinity, eternity and divine cooperation. This book revealed to me I could find the same inspiration beneath the soles of my feet in less than a foot of soil. My walks on earth will never be the same as they were. The writing, observation and devotion is infectiously compelling. The learning is deep and immense

A magnificent new overview of how we might live and feed ourselves without destroying ourselves ... It is riveting ... Along with a dazzling array of stats, there's also impressive investigative reporting ... rich food for thought, devastating figures, startling insights and even the odd joke ... A hugely important read

A call to raze the pastoral imaginary so that we can begin to think clearly about how we produce food and steward the soil ... To have any chance of turning the age of extinction into an age of regeneration, systemic reform, based on the facts, not pastoral myth-making, is essential

Colossally important... You've got to read it

A treasure trove of hope and solutions, and a vision for a sustainable, healthy, equitable world. We meet inspiring farmers as well as some radical solutions ... Comprehensive, devastating, rousing ... An essential book

Big ideas, beautifully written and the portraits of people building the alternatives are gorgeous! Makes you angry and enraptured with the beauty of the natural world all at once

A paean to the wonder that is the ecology of soil, scientifically informed and beautifully told. The perfect bank holiday read

Phenomenal. Clear, eloquent, fearless and devastating in its analysis. A revolution in the future of food

Glorious ... intelligent, deeply researched .... The point Monbiot makes so ably and so necessarily is that system change is both essential and possible through a complexity of solutions ... The stakes could not be higher. If a book can change hearts and minds about one of the most critical issues of our time, this rational, humane polemic is it

Revolutionary ... Rigorous, bold and clear-sighted ... To conjure the miracle of more food with less farming, we need to rethink what lies beneath our feet

Vivid and memorable... Regenesis is a compelling, deeply researched account of a deeply broken food system and how we might heal it

A compelling story of soil, food and farming

Ambitious and deeply researched ... Monbiot exposes, with journalistic flair, the 'gulf between perception and reality' about where and how our food is produced ... it includes some fascinating case studies ... bristling with ideas and imagination

Eye-opening, persuasive, meticulously researched [...] Monbiot thinks globally [... and] his arguments take account of the needs of everyone in society

A paean to soil, told more gracefully and memorably than anyone before him... Regenesis is likely to become a classic. Monbiot is a writer of the first rank

Inspiring, courageous, and bursting with ideas