The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons

April 28, 2014
Science writer Kean (The Disappearing Spoon) delves into the strange ways we've learned about the workings of our brains, rejuvenating with invigorating detail anecdotes that otherwise receive only brief textbook mention. Even his organization, with each chapter devoted to a particular scientific discovery, is assembled to be most effectively processed by the brain and its capacities for chunking smaller units of information. Reading this collection is like touring a museum of neuroscience's most dramatic anomalies, each chapter taking us to a different place and time. We see how the death of King Henry II of France initiated a curiosity for anatomy that persists today, learn that some of the most innovative theories of neuron function came from studying frog hearts, and how Paul Broca discovered the brain's "first language node." Of course, no collection of science's most enlightening maladies is complete without mention of Phineas Gage's famous incident with a tamping iron, but here it is rendered afresh. Indeed, Kean's colloquial language and intimate voice bring all of this series of mini-histories to lifeâall of which are sure to stimulate a wide range of brains.

Henry Leyva is the perfect narrator for Sam Kean's history of brain research and its reliance on accidents, diseases, and chronic conditions to reveal what we know now. In true Kean fashion, the academic approach is enlivened by anecdotes that illustrate the complexity and resilience of the human brain. Leyva's enthusiastic and lively performance delivers all the gravity, empathy, wonder, and humanity the book requires. It's crazy but true, fascinating and serious--a wondrous audio experience stuffed with Civil War soldiers with phantom limbs, Siamese twins that speak in stereo, people who believe their loved ones are imposters, and poor Phineas Gage, who lived for decades after an iron tamping rod went through his head--but with a different, coarser, personality. A.B. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine