The Secret Life of Circuits: An Illustrated Guide to Electronic Circuit Design, by Michal Zalewski Electrical circuits have always been a mystery to me. Those tiny components that look like Chiclets or jewelry beads somehow make a light blink, produce music, and detect motion. So I was happy to learn about The Secret Life of Circuits: An Illustrated Guide to Electronic Circuit Design , a new 400-page book by Michal Zalewski from No Starch Press , due in fall 2026. The book is full color and packed with Zalewski's own hand-drawn diagrams and workbench photographs. He ran product security at Google for 11 years, and has been a dedicated electronics tinkerer for three decades. Zalewski argues that the usual way circuits get taught, where current is like water and every part behaves like a clean math formula, leaves you stuck the moment you wire a real component to a real power supply. No Starch is letting anyone download Chapter 9, "Basic Electromechanical Devices," for free.…