Most of us recoil at the thought of bacteria. Ever since they have been discovered and identified as the cause of many communicable and potentially deadly diseases, they have earned a permanently grim place in our collective imagination. However, the vast majority of bacteria are innocuous, or even beneficial for our existence. We would literally starve to death were it not for all those wonderful bacteria that inhabit our digestive system and help in digestion.

This very short introduction takes a closer look at bacteria. The book covers their basic biological structure, evolutionary origin and development, as well as their epidemiological aspects. In fact, the greatest amount of space in this book is dedicated precisely to the medical and epidemiological aspects of bacteria. This book finally clarified for me what the antibiotics are, and it dispelled several myths about some bacteria that have caused major havoc either recently or throughout human history. (The so-called “flash eating bacteria” and the bubonic plague are two examples.) This focus on medicine and epidemiology is understandable – that’s probably what most people who are interested in this topic would want to learn more about anyways. However, I would have personally liked to learn more about the biochemistry of bacteria and all the insights into how they manage to do the basic functions of life. After all, bacteria are the simplest and most primitive living cells, and they are a perfect source of information on what is life really, including the biggest question of them all: how did life begin?

This book is very well written and it is very lucid in its presentation. It doesn’t require much more background knowledge than what was picked up in regular biology classes. It is accessible to a wide variety of readers, and anyone interested in learning more about bacteria would benefit from reading it.