a tribute to great non-fiction books across multiple genres
Thea Cooper and Arthur Ainsberg’s book Breakthrough: Elizabeth Hughes, the Discovery of Insulin, and the Making of a Medical Miracle is about medical science’s triumph over insulin-dependent diabetes. Breakthrough follows one of America’s first recipients of insulin, Elizabeth Hughes, but the book is only partly about her personal story. The book takes you on […]
Charlatan: America’s Most Dangerous Huckster, the Man Who Pursued Him, and the Age of Flimflam by Pope Brock is an engaging historical tale about medical quackery from the early 20th century. I enjoyed the brief mention this story had received in Mary Roach’s Bonk, but it was great to read the whole tale. The book […]
The Great Influenza by John M. Barry is a fascinating look at the influenza pandemic that rocked the world in 1918. This terrifying virus killed between 3-6% of the world’s population between June 1918 and December 1920, and infected almost 30%. It is a history book, but it is heavy in the science. It is […]
Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach is typical of her other books: it’s full of fun, interesting science, and is a little bit of crazy and a lot of hilarity. Having already traveled to the morgue and outer space with Roach, I was more than enthusiastic to follow her into […]
My latest read was Deadly Choices: How the Anti-Vaccine Movement Threatens Us All. This is a short book, written for the layman, about the anti-vaccination movement that has seen growing media attention in recent years. The book is written by a Dr. Paul Offit, a well-known pediatrician who specialises in infectious diseases and has worked […]
There are a lot of great books that I’ve read in the past that I want to give a quick nod to. Eventually, I may go back and write a dedicated entry for any I re-read them. In the meantime, I feel I owe them a few words here: The Poisoner’s Handbook by Deborah Blum […]