Nancy Andreasen, a leading neuroscientist, editor of the esteemed American Journal of Psychiatry, and recipient of the National Medal of Science, reveals the connections between the brain and the genome in her new book. Thanks to cutting-edge methods and discoveries in neuroscience and molecular biology, researchers know more than ever about the functions of the brain. The author describes in a fascinating and accessible way how everything is interconnected—from billions of tiny neurons in the thalamus to the moral control center in the prefrontal cortex. She explains the decoding of the genome, whose 30,000 to 40,000 genes are almost all active in some form in our brains. Through captivating stories, she also sheds light on how mental disorders develop and the impact they have on patients and their families.