num_pages: 317
description: Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in NonfictionNamed a Most Anticipated Book of 2022 by Literary HubA leading microbiologist tackles the scientific and sociopolitical impact of viruses in eleven striking essays. Invisible in the food we eat the people we kiss and inside our own bodies viruses flourishwith the power to shape not only our health but our social political and economic systems. Drawing on his expertise in microbiology Joseph Osmundson brings readers under the microscope to understand the structure and mechanics of viruses and to examine how viruses like HIV and COVID-19 have redefined daily life. Osmundsons buoyant prose builds on the work of the activists and thinkers at the forefront of the HIV/AIDS crisis and critical scholars like Jos Esteban Munoz to navigate the intricacies of risk reduction draw parallels between queer theory and hard science and define what it really means to go viral. This dazzling multidisciplinary collection offers novel insights on illness sex and collective responsibility. Virology is a critical warning a necessary reflection and a call for a better future.
language: English
title: Virology: Essays for the Living, the Dead, and the Small Things in Between
publisher: W. W. Norton & Company