The Body by Bill Bryson is a great book. This is an informative, educational book. It is not a college textbook - meaning it is not trying to teach biology to students of the body. It is not meant for diagnosing medical conditions or to classify medical problems of the body. This is not a manual of the human body that one can read to fix or change the human body. It is merely a guidebook - just as the subtitle "A Guide for Occupants" proposes. However, what a great guidebook it is! I was enthralled and could not stop. Once again, this was one of the first few books I listened to on my brand new audible subscription. Hence, it is possible that my curiosity about the audible format played into me liking the book very much. Anyway, let me focus on the book.
This book is split into 23 chapters spread over 14 hours of audio. Most chapters deal with individual systems in the body such as the brain, nervous, reproduction, respiratory, immune - you get the idea. Within each chapter, though, Bill Bryson goes into interactions of these systems with each other and with human society of today. For example, here is a quote: "The heart is the most mysterious of our organs. For a start it looks nothing like the traditional symbol associated with Valentine's day and the lovers symbol carved into tree trunks and such.". Then, there are other chapters that deal with how we got here over the hundreds of thousands of years past, what are our current travails and how might the future look like. After listening to the entire book, I was left feeling very well informed and also with a lot of questions about ourselves. I mean, for all we know about ourselves, it appears we still don't understand everything that really matters. Cancer, aging, emotions such as love, hate, what happens when we sleep, brain function - there is so much we just don't know. Throughout this book, my mind drifted to sci-fi novels and movies in which humans have augmented their trivial knowledge of human body with abundant imagination of the human body.
Apart from being a good inward looking scientific narrative of the human body, Bill Bryson additionally related me (the reader) to many events in human history. This is key! When the book weaves in narratives from human history, it brings human body to life (sorry for the pun). Meaning, the book relates the human body to human condition. This really drives the book deeper into the mind. This is what turns the book from being a thick, opaque biology textbook to being a easily readable true story narrative.
My only complain is that I have already forgotten many parts of the book - I blame it partly on listening to the book on 1.65 times normal speed and for multi-tasking when listening. In that sense, this is not a life altering book that will leave a mark on your mind. It is merely a guide to the human body that you will want to read once and use as a ready reference.
Happy reading!
This book is split into 23 chapters spread over 14 hours of audio. Most chapters deal with individual systems in the body such as the brain, nervous, reproduction, respiratory, immune - you get the idea. Within each chapter, though, Bill Bryson goes into interactions of these systems with each other and with human society of today. For example, here is a quote: "The heart is the most mysterious of our organs. For a start it looks nothing like the traditional symbol associated with Valentine's day and the lovers symbol carved into tree trunks and such.". Then, there are other chapters that deal with how we got here over the hundreds of thousands of years past, what are our current travails and how might the future look like. After listening to the entire book, I was left feeling very well informed and also with a lot of questions about ourselves. I mean, for all we know about ourselves, it appears we still don't understand everything that really matters. Cancer, aging, emotions such as love, hate, what happens when we sleep, brain function - there is so much we just don't know. Throughout this book, my mind drifted to sci-fi novels and movies in which humans have augmented their trivial knowledge of human body with abundant imagination of the human body.
Apart from being a good inward looking scientific narrative of the human body, Bill Bryson additionally related me (the reader) to many events in human history. This is key! When the book weaves in narratives from human history, it brings human body to life (sorry for the pun). Meaning, the book relates the human body to human condition. This really drives the book deeper into the mind. This is what turns the book from being a thick, opaque biology textbook to being a easily readable true story narrative.
My only complain is that I have already forgotten many parts of the book - I blame it partly on listening to the book on 1.65 times normal speed and for multi-tasking when listening. In that sense, this is not a life altering book that will leave a mark on your mind. It is merely a guide to the human body that you will want to read once and use as a ready reference.
Happy reading!
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