The Mosquito

Author: Timothy C. Winegard
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1524743437
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 639

Book Description
**The instant New York Times bestseller.** *An international bestseller.* Finalist for the Lane Anderson Award Finalist for the RBC Taylor Award “Hugely impressive, a major work.”—NPR A pioneering and groundbreaking work of narrative nonfiction that offers a dramatic new perspective on the history of humankind, showing how through millennia, the mosquito has been the single most powerful force in determining humanity’s fate Why was gin and tonic the cocktail of choice for British colonists in India and Africa? What does Starbucks have to thank for its global domination? What has protected the lives of popes for millennia? Why did Scotland surrender its sovereignty to England? What was George Washington's secret weapon during the American Revolution? The answer to all these questions, and many more, is the mosquito. Across our planet since the dawn of humankind, this nefarious pest, roughly the size and weight of a grape seed, has been at the frontlines of history as the grim reaper, the harvester of human populations, and the ultimate agent of historical change. As the mosquito transformed the landscapes of civilization, humans were unwittingly required to respond to its piercing impact and universal projection of power. The mosquito has determined the fates of empires and nations, razed and crippled economies, and decided the outcome of pivotal wars, killing nearly half of humanity along the way. She (only females bite) has dispatched an estimated 52 billion people from a total of 108 billion throughout our relatively brief existence. As the greatest purveyor of extermination we have ever known, she has played a greater role in shaping our human story than any other living thing with which we share our global village. Imagine for a moment a world without deadly mosquitoes, or any mosquitoes, for that matter? Our history and the world we know, or think we know, would be completely unrecognizable. Driven by surprising insights and fast-paced storytelling, The Mosquito is the extraordinary untold story of the mosquito’s reign through human history and her indelible impact on our modern world order.

Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People's Ears

Author: Verna Aardema
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0803760892
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 34

Book Description
"In this Caldecott Medal winner, Mosquito tells a story that causes a jungle disaster. "Elegance has become the Dillons' hallmark. . . . Matching the art is Aardema's uniquely onomatopoeic text . . . An impressive showpiece." -Booklist, starred review. Winner of Caldecott Medal in 1976 and the Brooklyn Art Books for Children Award in 1977.

Mosquito

Author: Andrew Spielman
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780571209804
Category : Diseases
Languages : en
Pages : 247

Book Description
'Consider the most common mosquito on Earth. This soft, little, dusty-brown insect is Culex Pipiens. You've seen her land on your arm. You have caught her just at the end of her feeding, her translucent belly swelling red with your very own blood. At such a moment, you can be forgiven for failing to notice what an elegant and hardy thing she is. But she is . . . ' No creature has touched directly the lives of more human beings than the mosquito. She has been a nuisance, a pollinator of plants and an angel of death all over the globe. And throughout history, much of our trouble with the mosquito has been caused by man himself. Professor Andrew Spielman has dedicated his life to understanding this insect. In Mosquito he tells the story of man's struggle to live with the mosquito, from the defeat of Sir Francis Drake's fleet, to the death of thousands of Frenchmen working on the Panama Canal and to the recent panic over the West Nile Virus in New York. And he shows us how we have accelerated the spread of disease, describing the catastrophic failures of mosquito control which have ensured that - even now - one person dies of malaria every twelve seconds.

The Mosquito

Author: Elise Gravel
Publisher: Tundra Books
ISBN: 0735266476
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 34

Book Description
Hilarious illustrated nonfiction about mosquitos perfect for beginning readers. Conversational text and silly illustrations will have you up all night reading about the most annoying bug on Earth! Fast mosquito facts: Distinctive trait: Leaving annoying itchy bites Diet: Your blood (and nectar and plant juice) Special talent: Making a terrible whining sound in your ear The Mosquito covers habitat (mosquitos live everywhere except Antarctica and Iceland!), species (over 3,500!), history (the oldest recorded mosquito was 79 million years ago!) and much more. Although silly and off-the-wall, The Mosquito contains factual information that will both amuse and teach at the same time.

Mosquitoes

Author: William Faulkner
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : New Orleans (La.)
Languages : en
Pages : 366

Book Description
Satirisk roman fra New Orleans

The Mosquito Coast

Author: Paul Theroux
Publisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 0241959195
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 497

Book Description
Winner of the Stanford Dolman Lifetime Contribution to Travel Writing Award 2020 The Mosquito Coast - winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize - is a breathtaking novel about fanaticism and a futile search for utopia from bestseller Paul Theroux. Allie Fox is going to re-create the world. Abominating the cops, crooks, junkies and scavengers of modern America, he abandons civilisation and takes the family to live in the Honduran jungle. There his tortured, messianic genius keeps them alive, his hoarse tirades harrying them through a diseased and dirty Eden towards unimaginable darkness. 'Stunning. . . exciting, intelligent, meticulously realised, artful' Victoria Glendinning, Sunday Times 'An epic of paranoid obsession that swirls the reader headlong to deposit him on a black mudbank of horror' Christopher Wordsworth, Guardian 'Magnificently stimulating and exciting' Anthony Burgess American travel writer Paul Theroux is known for the rich descriptions of people and places that is often streaked with his distinctive sense of irony; his novels and collected short stories, My Other Life, The Collected Stories, My Secret History, The Lower River, The Stranger at the Palazzo d'Oro, A Dead Hand, Millroy the Magician, The Elephanta Suite, Saint Jack, The Consul's File, The Family Arsenal, and his works of non-fiction, including the iconic The Great Railway Bazaar are available from Penguin.

Mosquitoes of the World

Author: Richard C. Wilkerson
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
ISBN: 1421438143
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1332

Book Description
The definitive reference on the biology, evolution, ecology, and diversity of all known species of the world's mosquitoes. Critical for entomologists, public health professionals, and epidemiologists across the world. Biting multiple times on two, three, or more different hosts, it is no surprise that some species of mosquitoes have co-evolved with pathogens. For humans and other animals, the result has been some of the most challenging diseases known. It has been said that Anopheles gambiae, as the primary transmitter of malaria parasites to humans, is the most dangerous animal in the world. Certainly malaria has killed more people than all the wars that ever took place. Even now, despite drugs and mosquito control, malaria claims the lives of 405,000 per year. The vast majority of mosquito species are not involved in pathogen transmission to humans, but those that are make a huge impact on global health. In this two-volume set, three of the world's leading experts on mosquito disease, ecology, and systematics offer readers unique insights into the fascinating world of mosquitoes while illustrating their diagnostic morphological features in detail. Comprehensively addressing the natural diversity of mosquitoes, the book explains their life histories, bionomic traits, and the physiological and physical adaptations they evolved in response to ever-changing environmental conditions. Mosquitoes are one of the best-known groups of insects, making this book a great starting place for anyone who would like to understand entomology by knowing the details about a representative family. Volume One contains a review of the biology and diversity of mosquitoes. Biology is treated in the following chapters: • Evolution • Nomenclature • Distribution • Development • Dormancy • Mosquito Movement • Feeding and Nutrition • Excretion • Copulation and Insemination • Egg Development and Oviposition The chapters on biology are followed by a well-illustrated summary of the characteristics of all 41 genera and of representative species of mosquitoes. This treatment of the morphological diversity of mosquitoes is accompanied by a glossary of all morphological terms used. Volume Two features • a long-awaited comprehensive mosquito taxonomic catalog detailing the current taxonomic and systematic status of all 3,698 valid species and subspecies, 41 genera, and 187 subgenera • a list of all taxa for definitive use of nomenclature • complete lists of species synonyms, distributions, key taxonomic works, and newly defined informal names • origins of scientific names Readers will discover that some mosquitoes undertake courtship rituals, while others guard their eggs, feed solely on earthworms, or can survive as immatures under ice sheets or in salt-encrusted pools. Hundreds of drawings and high-resolution, close-up images illustrate the text. The most complete reference work on mosquitoes ever produced, Mosquitoes of the World is an unmatched resource for entomologists, public health professionals, epidemiologists, and reference libraries.

Mosquito Empires

Author: J. R. McNeill
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139484508
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 391

Book Description
This book explores the links among ecology, disease, and international politics in the context of the Greater Caribbean - the landscapes lying between Surinam and the Chesapeake - in the seventeenth through early twentieth centuries. Ecological changes made these landscapes especially suitable for the vector mosquitoes of yellow fever and malaria, and these diseases wrought systematic havoc among armies and would-be settlers. Because yellow fever confers immunity on survivors of the disease, and because malaria confers resistance, these diseases played partisan roles in the struggles for empire and revolution, attacking some populations more severely than others. In particular, yellow fever and malaria attacked newcomers to the region, which helped keep the Spanish Empire Spanish in the face of predatory rivals in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. In the late eighteenth and through the nineteenth century, these diseases helped revolutions to succeed by decimating forces sent out from Europe to prevent them.

The Life Cycle of a Mosquito

Author: Bobbie Kalman
Publisher: Crabtree Publishing Company
ISBN: 9780778706656
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 36

Book Description
Explains how mosquitoes evolve, how they live, and precautions to take to avoid getting bit.

The Mosquito Bowl

Author: Buzz Bissinger
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062879944
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 585

Book Description
Instant New York Times Bestseller · Winner of the General Wallace M. Greene Jr. Award from the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation “Buzz Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights is an American classic. With The Mosquito Bowl, he is back with a true story even more colorful and profound. This book too is destined to become a classic. I devoured it.” — John Grisham An extraordinary, untold story of the Second World War in the vein of Unbroken and The Boys in the Boat, from the author of Friday Night Lights and Three Nights in August. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, college football was at the height of its popularity. As the nation geared up for total war, one branch of the service dominated the aspirations of college football stars: the United States Marine Corps. Which is why, on Christmas Eve of 1944, when the 4th and 29th Marine regiments found themselves in the middle of the Pacific Ocean training for what would be the bloodiest battle of the war – the invasion of Okinawa—their ranks included one of the greatest pools of football talent ever assembled: Former All Americans, captains from Wisconsin and Brown and Notre Dame, and nearly twenty men who were either drafted or would ultimately play in the NFL. When the trash-talking between the 4th and 29th over who had the better football team reached a fever pitch, it was decided: The two regiments would play each other in a football game as close to the real thing as you could get in the dirt and coral of Guadalcanal. The bruising and bloody game that followed became known as “The Mosquito Bowl.” Within a matter of months, 15 of the 65 players in “The Mosquito Bowl” would be killed at Okinawa, by far the largest number of American athletes ever to die in a single battle. The Mosquito Bowl is the story of these brave and beautiful young men, those who survived and those who did not. It is the story of the families and the landscape that shaped them. It is a story of a far more innocent time in both college athletics and the life of the country, and of the loss of that innocence. Writing with the style and rigor that won him a Pulitzer Prize and have made several of his books modern classics, Buzz Bissinger takes us from the playing fields of America’s campuses where boys played at being Marines, to the final time they were allowed to still be boys on that field of dirt and coral, to the darkest and deadliest days that followed at Okinawa.