Nature's building blocks: an A-Z guide to the elements

There is no political party that can unite such diversity within its membership as does the periodic table of the elements. 

This book pulls off the remarkable feat of combining essential information on all the known chemical elements with facts on their role in living systems, the history of each element, its uses, and its environmental role, all in a most readable way. In other hands this could well be dull, but in the hands of John Emsley it is a joy to read.