For six years, British journalist Richard Donkin made the study of work his vocation, and in Blood, Sweat & Tears he places defining moments from its historical development into a cohesive and revealing picture. Literally starting with when humans first began perfecting recognizable employment skills, Donkin examines the critical milestones that followed and the ways they fit together. Citing sources as disparate as The Dilbert Principle and Peter Drucker"s The Future of Industrial Man, he addresses the impact of slavery, organized religion, the time clock, child labor, unionization, the mid-20th-century workplace appropriations of the German and Japanese governments, women on the factory floor and in the boardroom, and current management trends. While cautioning against further interweaving of work into the "texture of our domestic existence," he notes that this transformation is but the latest in an age-old process. "The concept of revolution," he concludes, "is wholly inadequate in describing the changes in the way we live and this thing we call work." --Howard Rothman