Janaki Ammals was an exemplary life, and she has been lucky in her biographer. Historian of science, Savithri Preetha Nair, matches her subjects zest and energy, following her traces in far-flung archives in the United States, the United Kingdom and India. She closely tracks Janaki Ammals relations with her scientific peers, and with her extended family (to whom she was very close). Her scientific research and achievements are narrated expertly, in language accessible to a lay audience but with no sacrifice as regards complexity and nuance. When published, this will be the best biography of an Indian scientist written thus far. In the authoritativeness of its research, and the sensitivity of its treatment, it far outdoes the existing biographies of male scientific icons such as C. V. Raman, Homi Bhabha, and Meghnad Saha. Ramachandra Guha in The Telegraph
Savithri Preetha Nair's labour of love is truly inspiring, from the perspective of both biography-writing and writing history of science. Deepak Kumar, Historian of Science
It is the definitive biography of an Indian woman botanist who made many notable contributions but who never received her due in her long career. With extensive archival and other research, Savithri Preetha Nair recreates, for the first time, the life and times of the pioneering E. K. Janaki Ammal and of her contemporaries. This is also a very fine contribution to the history of science in India in the twentieth century. Jairam Ramesh, MP, former Union Minister, and author
