Preface // Acknowledgments // About the Author // I. The Nature of Living Things // 1. Strange Objects // 2. Living Cells, Lifeless Molecules // 3. Life Makes Itself // 4. Putting the Cell in Order // II. The Web That Weaves Itself // 5. The Darwinian Outlook // 6. Evolution of the Cell // 7. The Perennial Riddle of Life’s Origin // III. The Gyre of Complexity // 8. The Expansion of Life // 9. The Tangled Bank // 10. From Egg to Organism // 11. The Outer Banks of Order // Epilogue: Comprehensible, but Complex and Perplexing // Glossary // Notes // References // Index