Rachel Herz, Scent of Desire in USA Today Books

Roundup: Non-fiction, in brief
By Deirdre Donahue, Bob Minzesheimer, Jacqueline Blais and Jocelyn McClurg
USA TODAY, November 1

The Scent of Desire: Discovering Our Enigmatic Sense of Smell
By Rachel Herz
William Morrow, 266 pp., $24.95

You'll never take your nose for granted again once you've read The Scent of Desire. Rachel Herz explores what is considered our most mysterious sense, and the one often dismissed as the least important. But as Herz points out, you don't know what you've got till it's gone. (People who have lost their sense of smell often become dangerously depressed.) Herz examines the connection between taste and odor and the role smell plays in sexual attraction, as well as its power to evoke long-suppressed memories. But best are the weird facts. "Clean baby" is one of the very few smells every culture agrees is delightful.

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