What can and cannot be passed down from one generation to the next?

Karl Zimmer will be here to talk about his new book, She Has Her Mother's Laugh,

The Powers, Proversions, and Potential of Reddity.

Why would you want to take up Zumba in Middle Age?

Henry Alfred has his own reasons which he will share when he joins us to talk about his new book,

and then we danced, a voyage into the groove.

Alexander Altar will give us an update from the publishing world,

plus our critics Dwight Garner, Pearl Siegel, and Jen Selai will join us to talk about the latest

in literary criticism.

This is the Bookerview Podcast from the New York Times.

I'm Pamela Paul.

Karl Zimmer joins us now.

He is a colonist for the science times, and his latest book is called She Has Her Mother's Laugh.

The Powers, Proversions, and Potential of Heredity.

Karl, thanks so much for being here.

Thanks for having me.

Let's start with a very basic question, which is, what do we mean by Heredity?

You know, I think it depends on who you ask, but for me, Heredity are the ties that connect us to the past,

and will connect us to the future.

Some people think that that just means genes, but in my book, I try to make the point that

it's actually a lot more than genes.

So you mentioned the past.

...