The Book of the Spider

Like a cunningly designed web, Hillyard's survey and appreciation of the world's most despised, yet most beloved, creepy-crawlies will ensnare readers from arachnophobes to arachnophiles. Hillyard, who maintains the national collection of spiders at London's Natural History Museum, knows a good spider story when he hears one, and tells many here. In an engaging yet scientifically rigorous manner, he covers arachnophobia; spiders in myth and literature; venomous, aeronautic and other types of spiders; webs and spider silk; the conservation of spiders and the history of spiderology. He serves up tales of folk remedies that call for eating live spiders; of the Australian funnel-web spider, which ""strikes repeatedly and furiously at anything that moves""; of how, in 1876, a Chinese delegation presented Queen Victoria with a gown made of spider silk; of New Guinea natives using spiderwebs as fish-nets; of American arachnologist W.J. Baerg coolly observing the effects of his experiment in being bitten by a black widow. The only strand missing--and sorely missed--in Hillyard's design is any thorough discussion of spiders in popular culture, particularly in film. Even so, this literary web holds strong and tight, and is a must destination for anyone fascinated by these eight-legged, many-eyed, venom-dripping, fanged beasts of prey. Illustrations not seen by PW. (July)