Editor’s Note:On April 14, Dan Fagin won the Pulitzer prize in the general nonfiction fiction category for his book Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation, reviewed last August in The SandPaper’s sister publication, The Beachcomber. The Pulitzer wasawarded to “a distinguished and appropriately documented book of nonfiction by an American author.” The New York Times called it “a new classic of science reporting.” The book review follows.

So this is the story.

In 1949, a Swiss-owned company named Ciba steals into rural Toms River and scarfs up 1,360 acres of piney woodland, then builds a dye-making plant on 35…