Skulls

One of my favorite writers of non-fiction is Simon Winchester, the author of The Professor and the Madman (about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary), A Crack in the Edge of the World (about the 1906 San Francisco earthquake), and Krakatoa (about the 1883 volcanic explosion). His latest book is Skulls.

Skulls is an iPad app that explores, in great detail, the various skulls in Alan Dudley’s house. Dudley’s collection, one of the finest in private hands, ranges from the hippopotamus (largest) to the smooth newt (smallest) and also includes such oddities as a two-headed cow. Winchester’s supplementary text explains how Dudley, an Englishman who makes his living by creating fine wooden interiors for luxury cars, collected each specimen. Occasional digressions in the book, such as a brief essay about skull images in Renaissance art and an examination of the skull iconography associated with the Mexican Day of the Dead, provide breaks from zoology.

You can view the skulls in 3-D, zoom in on their features, and rotate them 360 degrees. Links lead you to additional information, such as photographs of the animal and zoological details such as average species size and life span. In addition to a number of video and audio interviews with Dudley, a switch turns on Winchester’s text narration so that the app becomes an audio book.

Skulls is a gorgeous app, one well worth $3.99, so check it out.