Part diary, part lab notebook, James Watson’s breezy account of how he and Francis Crick managed to decipher the structure of DNA changed biology and our view of biologists forever. Decades before reality TV pulled the curtain from every occupation from crab fishing to swamp logging, Watson chronicled not only his and Crick’s tedious and bumpy scientific journey in discovering the molecular shape of DNA (which laid the foundation for the genetic revolution) but also exposed the posturing and ego bruising that make science interesting — and scientists human.