I started The Body A Guide for Occupants about a year ago; I had kind of a pattern starting the year off with a science book of some sort. This year, I guess I’m also ending with one. This book is on the one hand pretty readable since the science is explained in some detail without getting too technical; my last biology class was well over a decade ago. On the other hand, it’s also incredibly dense, making it sort of hard to read for extended periods of time. One of the more readable qualities is the occasional moments of snark or off the wall remarks, like how much blueberry muffin would one need to power their brain for a certain period of time.
The book has chapters covering most of the major physical systems and processes, including hair and skin, brain, heart and blood, immune system, equilibrium, lungs and breathing, sleep, nerves and pain, medicine, and when things go bad (and also very bad). There’s general description of the biology and physiology, the history, what is and is not known now, probably a few key individuals, some credited and some not, as well as some consideration of what has changed over time and why.
One of the main things I remember is that there’s a lot we do know but just as much or more that we don’t. I don’t really remember anything specific about the science; there’s too much detail for me to retain much of anything there. The message about the level of knowledge and what’s still unknown though gets mentioned enough, especially in the final handful of chapters, that that’s the main thing I remember. This is an interesting book with a lot of information, generally written in an approachable way, but it’s information overload.
Maybe because I tried to read this in order, which in a lot of ways you don’t really need to do, I had to skim and sometimes kind of fight my way through parts of this; that’s not entirely a reflection on the book though. I don’t regret picking it up, but given that it’s taken me about a year to read, I am kind of glad to be done