The mosquito : a human history of our deadliest predator /
Timothy C. Winegard.
- x, 486 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
Includes bibliographical references (pages 449-461) and index.
Introduction -- Toxic twins : the mosquito and her diseases -- Survival of the fittest : fever demons, footballs, and sickle cell safeties -- General Anopheles : from Athens to Alexander -- Mosquito legions : the rise and fall of the Roman Empire -- Unrepentant mosquitoes : a crisis of faiths and the Crusades -- Mosquito hordes : Genghis Khan and the Mongol Empire -- The Columbian exchange : mosquitoes and the global village -- Accidental conquerors : African slavery and the mosquito's annexation of the Americas -- The seasoning : mosquito landscapes, mythology, and the seeds of America -- Rogues in a nation : the mosquito and the creation of Greater Britain -- The crucible of disease : colonial wars and a new world order -- Unalienable bites : the American Revolution -- Mercenary mosquitoes : wars of liberation and the making of the Americas -- Mosquitoes of Manifest Destiny : cotton, slavery, Mexico, and the American South -- Sinister angels of our nature : the American Civil War -- Unmasking the mosquito : disease and imperialism -- This is Ann : she's dying to meet you : the Second World War, Dr. Seuss, and DDT -- Silent springs and superbugs : the mosquito renaissance -- The modern mosquito and her diseases : at the gates of extinction -- Conclusion.
A pioneering and groundbreaking work of narrative nonfiction that offers a dramatic new perspective on the history of humankind, this text shows how through millennia, the mosquito has been the single most powerful force in determining humanity's fate.