MixedNatureRhodes’s discussions about environmental damage are welcome, and his tour of bold innovators is well guided. But he fails to mention the women who helped to revolutionize the field — from discoverer of nuclear fission Lise Meitner to solar-power pioneer Mária Telkes. Nor does he devote much space to renewable energy. His history is uneven in other ways: the latter third of the book is a critique of the anti-nuclear lobby that, in my view, skews the overall message ... A scholar of Rhodes’s stature should have offered a deeper understanding of our struggle to improve our energy capacity —one of our most pressing global challenges.
