Officially I did not finish The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat: And Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks. This is not because it was bad, but because it was not what I was exactly looking for. While it was technical in nature, the non-technical reader could partake in it without a lot of issues. However, I will admit, there were places where I read every single word of the sentence, knew exactly what each one meant, but still had no idea what I had just read. The subject is interesting and the presentation mostly clear, but again, there are terms and names the average person might not be familiar with, making things a little rough to read. However, it was overall good, but needed something different for my personal taste.
Of course I read the title story. I was expecting to see the Issue, the Study of the Issue and a Solution. I think I was looking for Examples to show you how to spot the situations that were being presented and while I know a cure is not necessarily possible, I wanted ways that it can be treated. Still, that first chapter of Dr. P and his “face blindness” (which went deeper than that) was interesting. I then read the last chapter about the autistic child. Due to the fact the edition of the book I had was an older hardcover, the language was very dated. Therefore, I was a little taken aback by the use of the word retarded to describe him. I was not really sure what Sacks was saying, but I was reading it to mean the term itself used might not be the correct one. However, he never seemingly offered a substitution or got to the point of what he thought the issues were or what possible corrections could be taken.
I think this book works best if you might have a bit more scientific mind, but as I said those of us who are less technical will be fine as well. I do wish I had an updated version of things, but it still worked out. I do know though that I needed some images! Seriously, I don’t remember how I used to just read all those novels/non-fiction without pictures!
