Green Newton 25th Anniversary Online Auction

Finalist for the National Book Award for Nonfiction (2002).

When Smoke Ran Like Water: Tales of Environmental Deception And The Battle Against Pollution, by Devra Davis, Basic Books, 2002, 316 pp. Hardcover. 

Davis tackles the subject of environmental pollution on two fronts, one personal and one professional. The first contains insight into her own life, starting from her roots in the metalworking town of Donora, Pa.--where the smog from pollution killed 20 outright in October 1948 and had lasting ill effects in townspeople, some fatal, in the months and years that followed. Her vivid descriptions of deadly smog in London as recent as the mid-1950s give the reader perspective about the inherent perils of industrial pollution to the public at large. An epidemiologist by training, Davis also chronicles the growing awareness of the spread of breast cancer (and pollution as a possible cause) in the 1990s, sterility and testicular cancer in men, and the impact of pollution on climate change. Although her prose relies heavily on statistics and historical accounts of pollution, Davis's personal narrative ties the story together nicely. (Scientific American)

​Retail Value: $25