Book #5: Survival of the Sickest by Dr. Sharon Moalem

Book #5
Title: Survival of the Sickest
Author: Dr. Sharon Moalem
Pages: 288
Grade: A
Buyability: 6/10
Status: Owned (freebie)

Do you ever look at your body and wonder how it works? Did you ever stop and think about the connection between body fat, tanning, and sunglasses? How about the links between cryogenics, tree frogs, the ice age and diabetes? Chances are you at least asked yourself the first of those questions, and if so, this book is an excellent (albeit a tad scary) look into just how complex your body really is.

Dr. Sharon Moalem is an expert in an emerging field known as evolutionary medicine - in short, how our bodies have adapted to the environment around us through natural selection and instinct.

The best thing about the book is its constant awareness of the reader. Although Survival of the Sickest could easily be enjoyed by any medical maven, it's just as easily read and loved by an average Jill like myself. The diction is very reader-friendly, with on exception. The chapter "Jump Into the Gene Pool" really turned me off - its style didn't seem to flow as well, perhaps because the subject matter was that much more complicated, but it really stuck out as a difficult to get through section of the book.

One of the ways Moalem makes the book readable is by adapting scientific and medical phenomena to pop culture or layman's terms. This has a mixed effect - in some cases I found it extremely helpful! In others, I found the writing to be cornball, hokey, and distracting. Overall though, Moalem does an excellent job of making the book readable.

Each chapter starts out with one large medical phenomena - either something common such as diabetes or death, or with something not-so-clear-cut which is explained through an anecdote, for example the blood disease hemochromatosis that the author himself is afflicted with. After that the story goes in several different directions, some which you question - where is this going - before wrapping it all up in a big flourishy bow at the end of each section. The book almost functions as a series of mini-medical movies it ties things together so well, at times in a very climactic way that makes you want to keep reading so you can figure out just what ice wine and tree frogs have in common with us. That's not to say the book shouldn't be read in chronological order - Moalem constantly refers back to past topics.

Finally, one thing I really enjoyed about the book was not only the fact it covered such huge topic areas (often combining ancient history with modern medicine in one fell swoop) but it also gave you some practical tips that could help on a day-to-day basis. Among them, limiting iron intake, being wary of sunglasses while tanning, and eating healthy while you are pregnant. These little tips are sprinkled throughout the book, although not explicity stated - which could actually help the reader, perhaps with a list at the end of what you can do NOW. Or it could be posted on Moalem's website for the book.

I was pretty excited to read Survival of the Sickest even prior to being chosen to review it. I'm not a medical person at all, and get kinda squeamish at most medical phenonmena (including a few in here...Guinea worms?) but for whatever reason the book intrigued me. I'm glad to say it continued to captivate me from cover to cover, and I'd highly recommend it to anyone!