Rating: 
Summary: Passes the sniff test
Review: As a former denizen of the NIH, I concur with most of the suggestions about how institutions protect the accepted and reflexively reject anything too different. As a former scientist, Turin's arguments made great sense to me and were fully creditable. As a student of Everett M. Rogers Diffusions of Innovations, I can readily believe that Turin falls directly into the Innovator group and will out of hand be rejected by even his closest friends.All of that said, this is an excellent book , well worth reading, not only for the fascinating theory of scent, but also about the lethargy with which the scientific community accepts radically new ideas (or rejects them). For any one who has been at the NIH or a major university this book will remind them of the politics and the pettiness of these great institutions. I loved my 4.5 years at the NIH for the extraordinarily brilliant people there. Nonetheless, I was constantly amazed at the puerile behavior of some of those geniuses.
Rating:
Summary: Passes the sniff test
Review: As a former denizen of the NIH, I concur with most of the suggestions about how institutions protect the accepted and reflexively reject anything too different. As a former scientist, Turin's arguments made great sense to me and were fully creditable. As a student of Everett M. Rogers Diffusions of Innovations, I can readily believe that Turin falls directly into the Innovator group and will out of hand be rejected by even his closest friends. All of that said, this is an excellent book , well worth reading, not only for the fascinating theory of scent, but also about the lethargy with which the scientific community accepts radically new ideas (or rejects them). For any one who has been at the NIH or a major university this book will remind them of the politics and the pettiness of these great institutions. I loved my 4.5 years at the NIH for the extraordinarily brilliant people there. Nonetheless, I was constantly amazed at the puerile behavior of some of those geniuses.
Rating:
Summary: A joy to read!
Review: Chandler Burr has created a riveting portrait of an astonishing man, Luca Turin, and his quest to unravel the mystery of olfaction. Burr's descriptions of Turin's work are seamless, and the reader is left with triumph and indignation at the refusal to consider Turin's theory by the scientific community. The book reminds me of McPhee at his best, ferreting into the joy of a magnificent obsession with infectious enthusiasm. The asides on the industry and nature of scent are fascinating, and the reviews of perfumes by Luca Turin make one wish for samples to be part of the book! A thrilling read!!
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating! Great Read!
Review: Chandler Burr has produced a terrific book here. An iconoclastic interdisciplinary science prodigy with a terrific memory,discerning nose and a revolutionary theory meets closeted specialists(chemists, perfumers, researchers) threatened by his very thoughts.
Instead of repeating the well-deserved praise others have written here, let me add:
1.- This book reminded me of The Cuckoo's Egg of some 12 years ago. Same procedural following a knowledgeable scientist on an expedition of discovery
2.- The publisher ought to produce a scratch-and-sniff edition! I wanted to smell Tocade, C10, C11, C12, Chanel #5 and aromatic esters along the way!
Rating: 
Summary: New ideas versus old faction
Review: Chandler Burr has written an interesting book in which we learn as much about the author as we do its subject - Luca Turin, Ph.D. Mr. Burr wants desperately to believe that the scientific establishment (and subsequently the Nobel Committee) has ignored the answer to the riddle of olfaction in the form of Turin's theory of smell. Has an out-of -the-box thinker, namely Turin, defied the odds and come up with the perfect description to explain how we sense odors? Doubtful, but that didn't deter Burr because Burr, like our subject Turin, is a dreamer at heart.
Here's my take on this book. First the facts: 1) Our understanding of olfaction is rudimentary at best 2) Perfume makers are a wily bunch who keep their cards close to their chest 3) Luca Turin likes to smell perfumes 4) Luca Turin believes that through his combination of esoteric scientific knowledge and imagination, he understands how we detect odors 5) Burr likes to cheer for the little guy - the underdog - and doesn't let pesky things (like facts) get in his way.
At its core, this book is about Luca Turin's imagination, plain and simple. While this doesn't necessarily translate into the scientific method, it makes for interesting reading. Crammed up in that brain of Turin's lie whimsical perfume descriptions, international corporate espionage and counterintelligence speculations, scientific publication conspiracies, and a lot of chemistry factoids. Unfortunately he ran out of room for scientific hypothesis and meaningful hypothesis testing. That didn't deter Turin (or Burr) from charging headlong into battle against other scientists with other convictions (and some actual data).
We certainly need people questioning dogma - otherwise how does knowledge accumulate. However, just because Turin questions the standard shape=smell dogma, doesn't mean he is correct. If you're looking to unlock the true mechanism behind olfaction, I don't think it's here, but if you want an entertaining read about imagination fueled with ego and where it leads, you'll love The Emperor of Scent.
Rating: 
Summary: Engaging story, but bad science
Review: Having read enthusiastic reviews of this book, I was surprised to find it ill-informed about olfaction science. I'm a biologist in a related field and I had never heard of Turin before, but after I finished "The Emperor of Scent," I read Turin's scientific papers. His ideas are interesting, but he hasn't done controlled experiments to support or refute them. Unfortunately, the background information that Burr provides to support Turin's ideas is frequently inaccurate. Burr is a good writer and seems to have done some background reading, so it's all the more disappointing that he doesn't subject Turin's work to greater scrutiny. This book was a fun read, but take it with a grain of salt.
Rating:
Summary: I Was Hooked! A Great Read!
Review: I could not put down this wonderful blend of perfumer profile, olfactory chemistry and scent history. As a perfume junkie, I've been long fascinated by the complexity and evocativeness of scents and amazed by the trends in the industry--or should is say "art?" This book is packed with terrific anecdotes of quirky perfume collectors, histories of great scents and lucid explanations of the still-mysterious process of olfaction. Burr's writing is crisp, zesty and amazingly clear. A little high school chemistry would help any reader with the more technical sequences of the book, but scientific expertise is not needed to enjoy the human angle of this unique book. I highly recommend it!
Rating:
Summary: The "not-so-sweet" smell of success
Review: I found this book to be a rare combination of truth being not only "stranger than fiction" but also being even more suspenseful. Being an academic myself but in the social sciences field, I found it ironic that even in the "pure" sciences there is a great deal of orthodoxy and dogmatism in changing paradigms. If the author is accurate in how the establishment literally turned their noses at the new theory of smell, then, excuse the pun, it stinks. The book deals sometimes in great detail about the science of smell and yet for the most part it reads almost like a taut movie script with a host of interesting characters that are vividly portrayed. Of course only time will tell if Lurin's smell paradigm will be eventually accepted by the science and business community but if and when it happens we can say we were there.
Rating:
Summary: a perfect read
Review: I was prompted to buy The Emperor of Scent from the seductive review in the New York Times...Curiously, that review focused only on the genius of Luca Turin's "vibrational theory of smell" and left out the not-incidental fact that Chandler Burr's writing makes this a minor masterpiece. It is truly one of the best scientific mysteries/procedurals I have ever read, written with passion, humor, and an indulgence that is never selfish or self-serving. This is a book that sounds so many unlikely notes: it makes you think of fine cheeses and Sauternes, of great conversation meandering long into the night, of human failings, of ordinary people who change the world. This is a book that makes me think not just of other favorite books, but of my favorite people -- is there any greater compliment than that?
Rating:
Summary: Not as compelling as I had hoped
Review: I was so terribly excited to read this book, being both a huge fan of scientific literature and someone who avidly devoured the book "Perfume" by Patrick Suskind. Scent fascinates me. Instead of the enlightening work I was expecting, this book was a strangely disjointed amalgam of mad scientist generalizations, kneejerk underdog defense, and the romanticization of a scientist (Turin) who I never quite believed in. Every time I felt Burr was getting to the meat of scent theory, he would glance off into a fervent defense of some peculiarity of Turin's behavior. It's all well and good that Turin is an eclectic jack-of-all-sciences with an apparently engaging overblown ego. That kind of character makes for a good story. But I was looking for the *science* of it all. The argument that Turin is right simply because the rest of the scientific world is against him doesn't fly with me. And the starry-eyed fanboy writing style wasn't enough to keep me engaged. I give this one a cranky two stars.
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