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Annual Subscription

Subscibe now for just €30 and get the next 6 issues. Price includes VAT, postage and packing. This price applies for addresses within Ireland North and South, Britain, and Europe.

We can also supply multiple issues to schools, institutes and colleges. For details contact Alan Doherty: alan@sciencespin.com

Rock around Ireland: A guide to Irish geology - Hardback

In this colourful book, Peadar McArdle, Director of the Irish Geological Survey, explains how all the rocks we see around us came to be there. Words and photographs help us to explore and understand Ireland's varied landscape. From granite hills we cross a limestone plain to the western coast and some very ancient rocks. From the black columnar basalt in the north, Peadar brings us south to red sandstones, formed when Munster was at the edge of a desert. There is a wealth of information here for everyone with an interest in rocks and the Irish landscape.

20euro (ex VAT, IRL, UK & EU only)

Irish Mammals

Irish Mammals
Juanita Browne
All of Ireland's mammals, on and offshore, on land, and even in the air, are described in this handsome book. The author, Juanita Browne is a zoologist and one time editor of Wild Ireland. In this book she explains how and where all these mammals live, and her accounts are backed up with drawings and a great selection of photographs.
For a review of this book, see our book review section.
Irish Mammals
Juanita Browne, Browne Books. 192 pp hardback.
Price: €15 post and packing included. (Irl, UK and EU only)

Rock around Ireland: A guide to Irish geology - Paperback

price 15 euro - irl, uk, eu only

Colour: What we see and the science behind sight

This very well-researched book describing various aspects of the 'science of colour' by Tom Kennedy, with contributions from Margaret Franklin, Ian Elliott, Sue McGrath and others is the first volume in the Science Spin Discovery Series.

The aim is to explain what we humans see in the visible world all around us, and the science behind science, in a lively, informative, and occasionally entertaining fashion. The colour illustrations and the writing here are top class, with interesting stories from contemporary life, and from history, that enliven the subject of colour for readers.

This is a wide-ranging account, everything from the science behind paints and dyes, to a description of why the sky is blue, to colour television and lasers is covered here. Anyone that is curious about the natural world around them, and how it works, should read this book.

(price 15euro irl,uk,eu only)

Bewley's, 2004 Edition - Paperback

This is the story of the legendary Dublin coffee house, Bewley's and its many colourful patrons down through the decades. This book tells the story of the Bewley family, how their Grafton Street coffee house came into existence, and characters such as the boxer Jack Doyle, the poet Patrick Kavanagh, and the Sinn Féin revolutionary Arthur Griffith that enjoyed its atmosphere. Bewley's survived the 1916 Easter Rising, the War of Independence and The Emergency years during WWII and lived to tell the tale. That tale is told here with wit and flair by author Hugh Oram.

(Price 12euro - irl, uk, eu only)

Gold Frenzy

Gold Frenzy by Peadar McArdle

The story of Ireland’s gold rush when thousands converged on the Goldmine River near Avoca in hopes of finding a fortune. In 1795 the chance discovery of a nugget led to a frenzy that persisted into modern times as people were convinced that the ancient mother lode could be rediscovered. Among those to join in the hunt was Charles Stuart Parnell, and with independence, nationalists believed that Wicklow’s gold could solve Ireland’s economic woes.

In this entertaining and highly informative book, Peadar McArdle, former Director of the Geological Survey of Ireland, tells the story as it unfolded over the years, and we learn how the gold was brought to the surface by ancient volcanic activities millions of years ago.

The Exemption - Hardback

In the Old Jewish Quarter of Budapest, in Café Spinoza, a woman sits at her regular table by the window. She watches the tourists filing past, but from a distance of sixty years, still hears the sound of German soldiers marching. If not for a curious grace this would have been her round to Auschwitz.

The Exemption is the story of Vera Hajnal, of her courage during a wartime adolescence, "when bombs gave you more of a chance than people" and of her passion and perseverance as the country is rebuilt in the wake of devastation. Great hope and sacrifice soon turn to disillusionment on seeing how the ideals of a just society are gradually, but steadily, betrayed.

A private chronicle unfolds, recounted with sparkling humour and perception, of student days, family life and a professional career, punctuated by the occasional family recipe, police raid or prison visit. In the changing political climate, the borders open and a new Irish dimension develops with the arrival of a son-in-law from Dublin.

An inveterate story teller, our author Vera takes us on a journey from the Danube to the Liffey that brings us through the realms where History meets the every day, where hilarity and pain collide to produce an intoxicating cocktail of the absurd. Above all, it is about the thrill of staying alive.

(price 25euro - irl,uk,eu only)

St Vincent's Hospital Fairview: An illustrated history 1857-2007 - Hardback

An illustrated history detailing now the hospital, started with money handed over to an informer, provided a safe haven for thmentally ill over the course of 150 years. As the author, Aidan Collins, who works as a doctor in the hospital, explains, Vincents not just shaped the way nurses are trained, but even had an influence on James Joyce. Many of the original features remaining in the area are described in his unusual book.

(price 35euro - irl, uk, eu only)

St Vincent's Hospital, Fairview: An illustrated history 1857-2007 - Paperback

An illustrated history detailing now the hospital, started with money handed over to an informer, provided a safe haven for the mentally ill over the course of 150 years. As the author, Aidan Collins, who works as a doctor in the hospital, explains, Vincents not just shaped the way nurses are trained, but even had an influence on James Joyce. Many of the original features remaining in the area are described in his unusual book.

(price 20euro irl,uk,eu only

Irish Science Handbook

The Irish Science Handbook covering the entire science community. Research groups, institutions, associations throughout Ireland. More than 700 points of contact and over 1,000 hyperlinks. 80 pages.

Sensational Brain

The Sensational Brain
What it is, how it works. Dr Veronica Miller explains all about the brain in a way that makes sense to everyone. Fully illustrated hardback, A5 landscape, 160 pp.