-
Get a Free Issue
of our Ezine!
Summary | Excerpt | Reviews | Beyond the book | Read-Alikes | Genres & Themes | Author Bio
A Guide for Occupants
by Bill Bryson
Book Reviewed by:Bill Bryson, bestselling author of A Short History of Nearly Everything, takes us on a head-to-toe tour of the marvel that is the human body. As addictive as it is comprehensive, this is Bryson at his very best, a must-read owner's manual for everybody.
Bill Bryson once again proves himself to be an incomparable companion as he guides us through the human body--how it functions, its remarkable ability to heal itself, and (unfortunately) the ways it can fail. Full of extraordinary facts (your body made a million red blood cells since you started reading this) and irresistible Bryson-esque anecdotes, The Body will lead you to a deeper understanding of the miracle that is life in general and you in particular. As Bill Bryson writes, "We pass our existence within this wobble of flesh and yet take it almost entirely for granted." The Body will cure that indifference with generous doses of wondrous, compulsively readable facts and information.
7. THE HEART AND BLOOD
Stopped.
Last word of British surgeon and anatomist Joseph Henry Green (1791– 1863)
while feeling his own pulse
I
THE HEART IS the most misperceived of our organs. For a start, it looks nothing like the traditional symbol associated with Valentine's Day and lovers' initials carved into tree trunks and the like. (That symbol first appeared, as if from out of nowhere, in paintings from northern Italy in the early fourteenth century, but no one knows what inspired it.) Nor is the heart where we place our right hand during patriotic moments; it is more centrally located in the chest than that. Most curious of all, perhaps, is that we make it the emotional seat of our being, as when we declare that we love someone with all our heart or profess a broken heart when they abandon us. Don't misunderstand me. The heart is a wondrous organ and fully deserving of our praise and gratitude, but it is not invested even slightly in our emotional well-being.
That's a good ...
With his characteristic wit, he takes his readers on a survey of anatomy that successfully outlines what makes us human. The book will certainly appeal to Bryson’s ever-growing fan base and delight anyone who enjoys acquiring new information about a topic they think they already know well. I've read everything he has written and believe it to be far and away his best work to date...continued
Full Review
(674 words)
This review is available to non-members for a limited time. For full access,
become a member today.
(Reviewed by Kim Kovacs).
Bill Bryson's The Body: A Guide for Occupants is an engaging exploration of the human body, packed with interesting trivia about human anatomy. Some of the most memorable facts the author presents are:
This "beyond the book" feature is available to non-members for a limited time. Join today for full access.
If you liked The Body, try these:
by Cat Bohannon
Published 2023
The real origin of our species: a myth-busting, eye-opening landmark account of how humans evolved, offering a paradigm shift in our thinking about what the female body is, how it came to be, and how this evolution still shapes all our lives today
by Neil Shubin
Published 2021
The author of the best-selling Your Inner Fish gives us a lively and accessible account of the great transformations in the history of life on Earth--a new view of the evolution of human and animal life that explains how the incredible diversity of life on our planet came to be.
.gif)
The Very Long, Very Strange Life of Isaac Dahl
by Bart Yates
A saga spanning 12 significant days across nearly 100 years in the life of a single man.
.png)
Smothermoss by Alisa Alering
A haunting, imaginative, and twisting tale of two sisters and the menacing, unexplained forces that threaten them and their rural mountain community.