Liz Phair

I loved the drama of this exploration into the mechanism of smell, itself wrapped inside the romantic tale of a curmudgeonly scientist obsessed with his own exquisitely refined appreciation of perfume. This book gives a behind-the-scenes look into the world of manufactured scent: the history, the most prized essences, the sterile labs, the villainy, the exotic extracts, the big retail business—and the pure joy of olfactory response in customers who can recall major events in their life by inhaling a whiff of the cologne they wore at the time.