A NOTE FROM MICHAEL SIMS:

When editors at National Geographic Books called and asked me to adapt the documentary "In the Womb: Animals" into a book, how could I resist?

I grew up in the country in eastern Tennessee, raising dogs and rabbits and ducks, guinea pigs and hamsters, a turtle and a horse. One of my earliest journal entries, as a teenager, was about the birth of our dog's pups. I’ve watched the beautiful and mysterious process of birth from the outside too many times to not want to follow it from the inside.

Published in time to coincide with the premier of "In the Womb: Extreme" on the National Geographic Channel in spring 2009, the book will be the second in the popular series launched by "In the Womb."

National Geographic is providing photography from the documentaries and from their own amazing resources, including dazzling CGI work, to illustrate the book.

Actually I’m adapting two episodes of the "In the Womb" series into a single book—"Animals" and "Extreme." My book follows the three stars of "Animals"—a golden retriever, a bottlenose dolphin, and an Asian elephant—and adds for comparison animals from "Extreme," including a red kangaroo, an emperor penguin, a lemon shark, and a parasitic wasp.

If readers have anywhere near as much fun reading "In the Womb: Animals" as I’m having writing it, I’ll be happy.

Praise for In the Womb: Animals

"What is life like in the womb? Thanks to National Geographic, we’ve been able to refresh our memories with a beautiful book . . . and it’s weirder than I ever expected.
. . . In the Womb: Animals is mesmerizing, and it can turn you or anyone you know into a veritable fountain of Wow Facts. Since the book is about gestation, it is also about sex, and there is a lot more variation in how animals mate than I’d ever suspected. . . .

An aspect of this book that I particularly appreciated is the deftness of author Michael Sims’s prose. It doesn’t read like one amazing info-bit after another, though to a large extent that’s the material he has to deal with. The tone is conversational and lightly amusing. Discussing the prenatal development of a dog’s mouth, he writes that it is also the equipment he will use to bark, "that impressive tool dogs use to greet, notify, and threaten, as well as to torment writers who are trying to concentrate.". . . Scientists don’t claim to have all the answers; as Sims says, "all over the planet, human beings are amassing . . . facts and doing the best they can to interpret them. When nature reminds us that our explanations are approximate, we tweak them again." This work of observing and theorizing is thrilling. "How exciting," Sims writes, "to decipher old mysteries and discover new ones in previously uncharted territory — inside molecules, at the bottom of the sea, beyond our galaxy, and in the womb." This beautiful record of animal life in the womb is not produced by cats or crocodiles but by members of our own human race, the most curious (in all senses of the word) creature of them all."
—Frederica Mathewes-Green, NATIONAL REVIEW

"In the Womb: Animals is a book of breathtaking beauty and awesome drama. Brisk text and vivid images of embryos remind us of our shared ancestry with other animals, from dogs to dolphins, penguins to kangaroos. The astonishing transition to birth reminds us that all of us are capable of wondrous transformations. Thank you, Michael Sims, for this glorious tribute to the artistry of the womb."
—Sy Montgomery, author of The Good Good Pig and Journey of the Pink Dolphins

"In the Womb: Animals offers a new window into animals’ amazing beginnings, through incredible images and thought-provoking text and true to National Geographic’s marvelous interpretation of life on our planet."
—Joan Embery, president of the Embery Institute for Wildlife Conservation and conservation ambassador for the Zoological Society of San Diego

"These unforgettable images remind us that every animal’s story begins even before it enters the world. From our beloved dogs to dolphins, from elephants to exotic creatures, this book reveals how biology and behavior begin to intertwine from the very first moments of life."
—Melissa Jo Peltier, co-author of Cesar’s Way and executive producer of The Dog Whisperer

"How can an air-breathing dolphin be born underwater? Why does a jellybean-sized kangaroo fetus decide to crawl out of the womb? Reading how species develop their diverse abilities while still in the womb is not just exhilarating; it is humbling to be reminded of the astounding diversity of life."
—Bruce Fogle, author of New Dog and The New Encyclopedia of the Dog

"Imagine if you could see the dog you love before she was born. Imagine if you could follow every week of her development in the womb. I cannot suggest a better present to a dog lover (or dolphin fanatic or elephant aficionado) than this beautiful book. I can only hope that one day every species will have a book like this. Not only will you be enchanted by the images, the text too is quite wonderful, telling you lots of fascinating things I bet you didn’t (I didn’t) know."
—Jeffrey Masson, author of When Elephants Weep and Dogs Never Lie about Love

"Richly illustrated with intrauterine images of various species of animals, this book provides remarkable insight into why animals develop the way they do, why there is so much variety in how animals reproduce and grow, and how natural selection and evolution have shaped the animals’ features. In addition, each page is packed with information on animal behavior, curious anatomical adaptations, and tidbits of natural history."
—Don E. Wilson, Department of Vertebrate Zoology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution