I wanted to enjoy this book, as the subject matter is fascinating, but the author's writing style is confusing to the point of opacity. Different scientific theories are either given bizarre names, like "tangled bank", or attached to the names of the originating scientists. Tangential metaphors, or even poems, are thrown about willy-nilly. I became so confused trying to figure out what was what, and who was who, that I gave up about halfway through the book. For truly excellent expositions on developmental biology -- lucid, informative, and entertaining -- you cannot do better than the books by Dawkins.