Science · Similar reads
Books like Life Ascending
The best books like Life Ascending are The Selfish Gene, Why Evolution Is True, and A Short History of Nearly Everything. Life Ascending by Nick Lane is about evolution, origins of life, biochemistry. If that's what drew you in, here are 12 books that share its DNA — each summarized on Superbook, and ready to chat with in the app.
- The Selfish Gene
01
Richard Dawkins · Science
The Selfish Gene reframes evolution from the organism's point of view to the gene's.
Shares evolution and natural selection with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - Why Evolution Is True
02
Jerry A. Coyne · Science
Why Evolution Is True is evolutionary geneticist Jerry Coyne's systematic case for evolution, written for readers who want a rigorous but accessible treatment of the evidence.
Shares evolution and natural selection with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - A Short History of Nearly Everything
03
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Bill Bryson · Science
A Short History of Nearly Everything is Bill Bryson's attempt to understand the scientific story of everything — from the Big Bang to the emergence of modern humans — by spending three years talking to scientists and reading science history.
Both dig into evolution.
Read the summary → - Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body
04
Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body
Neil Shubin · Science
Your Inner Fish is paleontologist Neil Shubin's account of how understanding the deep evolutionary history of vertebrates reveals the origins of the human body.
Both dig into evolution.
Read the summary → - The Ancestor's Tale
05
Richard Dawkins · Science
The Ancestor's Tale is Richard Dawkins's account of the history of life on Earth, told backwards: beginning with humans and traveling back in evolutionary time to meet successive ancestors at the points where different lineages join.
Both dig into evolution.
Read the summary → - Transformer
06
Nick Lane · Science
Transformer is Nick Lane's investigation of the Krebs cycle — a metabolic pathway discovered in the 1930s that every living cell on Earth runs — and his argument that this cycle is not merely the engine of cellular energy but a chemical record of how life first emerged from inorganic chemistry.
Shares evolution and origins of life with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - Climbing Mount Improbable
07
Richard Dawkins · Science
Climbing Mount Improbable is Richard Dawkins's response to the persistent intuition that complex biological structures — the vertebrate eye, insect wings, spider webs — are too improbable to have evolved by chance.
Shares evolution and natural selection with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - On the Origin of Species
08
Charles Darwin · Science
On the Origin of Species, published in 1859, is the book in which Charles Darwin presented the theory of evolution by natural selection to the general reading public.
Shares evolution and natural selection with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - The Blind Watchmaker
09
Richard Dawkins · Science
The Blind Watchmaker is Richard Dawkins's argument that natural selection — cumulative, non-random selection acting on random variation — is sufficient to explain the apparent design in biological organisms.
Shares evolution and natural selection with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution
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The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution
Richard Dawkins · Science
The Greatest Show on Earth is Richard Dawkins's systematic presentation of the evidence for evolution by natural selection.
Shares evolution and natural selection with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - The Vital Question
11
Nick Lane · Science
The Vital Question asks why life is the way it is — why all complex life is eukaryotic, why eukaryotes all have mitochondria, why sex exists, why organisms age and die, and why life may be exceedingly rare in the universe.
Shares evolution and origins of life with Life Ascending.
Read the summary → - A Crack in Creation: Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution
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A Crack in Creation: Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution
Jennifer A. Doudna and Samuel H. Sternberg · Science
A Crack in Creation is Jennifer Doudna and Samuel Sternberg's account of how CRISPR-Cas9 works, what it can do, and why its possibilities should give everyone pause.
Both dig into evolution.
Read the summary →
Books like Life Ascending: quick answers
What are the best books like Life Ascending?
The best books like Life Ascending by Nick Lane are The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins, Why Evolution Is True by Jerry A. Coyne, A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson, Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body by Neil Shubin, The Ancestor's Tale by Richard Dawkins, plus 7 more below. Each was chosen for themes it shares with Life Ascending, such as evolution, origins of life, biochemistry.
What should I read after Life Ascending?
A natural next read after Life Ascending is The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins. Shares evolution and natural selection with Life Ascending. Other strong choices are Why Evolution Is True by Jerry A. Coyne, A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson, Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body by Neil Shubin.
What books are similar to Life Ascending by Nick Lane?
Life Ascending centers on evolution, origins of life, biochemistry. Books with a similar feel include The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins, Why Evolution Is True by Jerry A. Coyne, A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson, Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body by Neil Shubin, The Ancestor's Tale by Richard Dawkins, Transformer by Nick Lane — all free to read and chat with on Superbook.
