Hidden Creatures Review by Dino Martinez – The Disgusting World of Parasitology | Science and nature books

WWhen human genome mapper Craig Venter set out on a sailboat to map DNA in seawater around the world, he found that an average teaspoon of seawater contained 50 million viruses. Although this doesn’t sound particularly reassuring, the bad news is tempered by the fact that most of these phages infect marine bacteria and have no interest in us.

Viruses are parasites, and like all parasitic species, they get a free ride from living organisms. The primary goal of multicellular life is to create a comfortable environment for the cells to live in, and evolution has invented all kinds of stowaways who want this comfort and are able to join in, either outside the cells themselves or sometimes inside them. While it is generally not in the parasite’s interest to kill its host and have to find a new home, some come dangerously close. Most diseases in the developing world are linked in one way or another to parasitic infections.

The Book of Dino Martins is a fascinating compendium of all the creatures, some big, some small, some harmless, some deadly, that lie in wait for unsuspecting warm-blooded creatures. It unfolds along four separate writing paths. The first consists of lyrical descriptions of nature itself written by an observer with a keen love for what he sees. The lyricism extends to scenes of horror: the exquisite prose, for example, comes from the description of an elephant carcass rotting in the Kenyan afternoon sun, slowly decomposed by a mass of worms. “A boiling cauldron of maggot stew ripples in steamy waves,” and Martins happily sticks his hands into the liquefied flesh to taste the larvae while dryly noting that the air “shines and stinks.” The tone then shifts from lyrical to taxonomic tone, listing the different genera and orders of animals involved. Martinez, as well as the reader, marvels at nature’s creativity.

Then comes the charge sheet. One of the scariest sections deals with the life cycle of eyeworms. I’ve never heard of them before and can’t read the book. They live in the eye socket – the eyelids, conjunctiva and tear glands. Female worms lay eggs that hatch, and the larvae swim in the tears. Flies attracted to the “crying of worms” lick the larvae; Inside the fly, the larvae burrow from the intestine to the testicle or egg follicle, mature, then migrate to the fly’s head and wait. When that fly visits another animal’s eyes to drink, the larvae emerge and the cycle begins again.

It is understandable that at several points in the book, Martins shifts, perhaps reluctantly, into “extermination of savages” mode after explaining the diabolical intelligence, indeed beauty, of the life cycle of certain organisms that continue to cause ongoing misery or vile, debilitating disease in millions of people. Finally, just when you think you can’t say another word about any creature other than the domestic cat, he regales the reader with innocently charming tales of his field trips in Kenya and his conversations with students and farmers.

I once worked at a marine station at a time when zoology was diversifying into molecular biology and ecology, and I remember being concerned that the zoologist itself was among the endangered species. I was wrong to worry: the animal world has simply adapted, and must now be a master of six trades to understand what nature throws its way. In Martinez’s interdisciplinary novel, Parasites evokes in the reader the kind of feeling one reserves for clever, creative criminals: admiration for the brilliance of the scam, disgust at the details of the sting, and determination to put an end to it. But in the end, perhaps the most enduring feeling, and one that Martins beautifully conveys, is one of awe at the sheer diversity and creativity of the living world.