As I briefly mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I have set myself the goal of reading more popular science in 2014. It’s a genre I have enjoyed on the very few occasions I have dipped into it, so I’m not really sure what has been holding me back. To spur me on, I thought I’d make into a challenge, so here we go.

I think the aim will be to read one popular-science book per month (though I’ll still count it as a success if I manage to read 10 in a year). I’ve put together a list of titles recommended to me by people I trust (below), but this is just a starting point (and also a much longer list than I’ll get through in a year). Any popular science (including biographies or other forms of science history) will count.

I’ll create a page to keep track of how I’m doing in this challenge shortly. Does anyone fancy joining me? If so, feel free to use the button I have created (with huge thanks to Doublecompile for making the line drawing available through Creative Commons) and let me know how you get on!

Without further ado, here’s the list I’ll be starting from:

A Hole at the Bottom of the Sea: the Race to Kill the BP Oil Gusher by Joel Achenbach
The Edge of Physics: Dispatches from the Frontiers of Cosmology by Anil Ananthaswamy
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
Why Does e=mc²? by Brian Cox
Smile or Die by Barbara Ehrenreich
Measure of the Earth: the Enlightenment Expedition that Reshaped the World by Laurie Ferreiro
How the Hippies Saved Physics: Science, Counterculture and the Quantum Revival by David Kaiser
The 4% Universe: Dark Matter, Dark Energy, and the Race to Discover the Rest of Reality by Richard Panek
Packing for Mars by Mary Roach
Stiff by Mary Roach
Fermat’s Enigma by Simon Singh
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Backroom Boys by Francis Spufford
The Double Helix by James Watson

I’ll add to this list any further recommendations that take my fancy. So who’s with me?