I do think that the genome war provides both, and gives a lot more background information of all the key players including those who worked for Venter and those who worked for the other side with the Human Genome Project. I learned of several new business men, and several new papers published at the time which I will follow up on. Particularly those which deals with all the new computer science, bioinformatics if you will, which was founded at the time.

As a final note I will say that Venter's account of the war is better written and easier to understand. Had I not read Venter's book first, this whole book would have made much less sense.

No matter where you stand on the "Gene wars", I can't recommend this book enough. Venter's account is personal, detailed, and compelling. You can tell he is a guy who genuinely cares about the science, and cares about changing the world.

I think this youtube video does a pretty good job of capturing some of what you can expect to read.

It is an in depth set of lectures on human cells by John K. Young, professor of medicine at Howard University.

This book would serve well for someone looking for a review of human molecular biology, or for someone who wants to get a bit familiar with the terms, but the book failed in terms of making cell biology interesting. Young talks like someone who wants to make the material interesting, but fails. It is a common dilemma for professors.

Still the book does cover the cell functions, from composition of our organs, to our brains, nervous system, hormones, reproduction, and lastly, aging. It was a good book to have playing in the background and catch snippets.