Sleeping Beauties

Life innovates constantly, producingperfectly adapted species - but there'sa catch. ATIMESANDTELEGRAPHBEST BOOK OF 2023 'Hopeful and fascinating.'THE TIMES Many animals and plants eke outseemingly unremarkable lives. Passive,constrained, modest, threatened. Then, ina blink of evolutionary time, they flourishspectacularly. Once we start to look, these'sleeping beauties' crop up everywhere.But why? Looking at the book of life, from apexpredators to keystone crops, and informedby his own cutting-edge experiments,renowned scientist Andreas Wagnerdemonstrates that innovations can comefrequently and cheaply to nature, wellbefore they are needed. We have foundprehistoric bacteria that harbour theremarkable ability to fight off 21st-centuryantibiotics. And human history fits thepattern too, as life-changing technologiesare invented only to be forgotten,languishing in the shadows before they finally take off. In probing the mysteries of thesesleeping beauties, Wagner reveals a crucialpart of nature's rich and strange tapestry.