RaveThe New York Times Book ReviewA beautiful, profound and important book ... Truth and Repair stands entirely on its own, but when read alongside Trauma and Recovery, it is striking to see how consistent Herman’s tone of measured, calm inquiry has been through the decades, how firm her resolve, how clear her language. Each book has immense value.
Daniel Bergner
RaveNew York Times Book ReviewA profound and powerful work of essential reporting ... He poses questions about the ethical challenges, complex social issues and other problems of modern biological psychiatry, and he makes a strong case that radical examination and change are urgently required ... It is with great skill that Bergner places Caroline’s story in context of the history of modern psychiatry. It’s hard to do justice to the sweep of the larger story he tells, but probably the most shocking part is the utter randomness that has characterized so much of the modern search for psycho-pharmaceuticals ... This is an interesting set of interviewees, all dedicated, hardworking, highly knowledgeable scientists, who frankly acknowledge how poor the efficacy of many drugs is, how much of a toll they can take on people who use them and how little we know about how the brain actually works ... In programs like Caroline’s, medication may be included, but the spirit of treatment is \'person-centered.\' The phrase doesn’t do justice to the extraordinary, intimate and wise interactions that Bergner describes in these places.
Simon Baron-Cohen
MixedNew York Times Book ReviewBaron-Cohen is at his most striking when he writes about people with autism, like Jonah, who was slow to talk but who taught himself to read ... Mostly, though, The Pattern Seekers is about the idea of using autism as a key to unlock the mystery of human cognition, and on this front, it’s less convincing. Sometimes it’s simply because the book’s framing is misleading. Baron-Cohen takes great care to set up the idea that all humans possess a Systemizing Mechanism, that some people are hyper-systemizers, and that a comparatively high number of those hyper-systemizers are autistic. But the subtitle of the book is not how systemizing drives human invention, it’s how autism drives human invention. At the same time, he cautions against speculation that people, living or dead, might be autistic. The term should be reserved only for diagnosis when people are struggling to function, he explains ... As Baron-Cohen describes it, the Systemizing Mechanism is so all-powerful, it explains evolutionary change, historic progress and individual excellence — including, for example, the ancient shift from simple to complex tool use, the invention of the light bulb and the late Kobe Bryant’s highly regimented training schedule. It’s true, all these scenarios can be described as looping sequences of if-and-then reasoning. But it’s a much greater leap to show that this is the main engine of evolution, or that it demonstrates how human brains work in real time, or that the two things have much in common.
Anthony David
PositiveThe New York Times Book ReviewDavid’s stories are fascinating, and he does something quite remarkable with his tone. Here the obvious comparison is to the neurologist and prolific writer Oliver Sacks, often described as the poet laureate of medicine. Even when Sacks wrote about tragedy, his narratives were imbued with meaning, and if not positivity, then at least a sad beauty. David appears not to be driven by the same impulses. Even when his case studies have positive endings, a rather thick vein of gray runs through them ... David’s encounters, bracing as they are, made me wonder if there isn’t something oppressive about the insistence on majesty and wonder in modern science writing. Life can be awful, after all. Fiction, generally, is allowed to stun and depress but there is pressure on nonfiction to offer consolation or at least guidance. David leaves some big questions uncomfortably unresolved, and his stories are all the more haunting for it. Rarely have I read a book whose title is so true. Reading it was like standing on the edge of a great chasm and seeing how easily an unforeseen mishap could send any one of us tumbling in.
Maria Popova
PositiveThe New York Times Book Review\"... strange and lovely ... Generally [the book] proceeds through a series of surprising links, fascinating diversions and sometimes dizzying associative drift. When the connections cohere, it’s like carefully constructed fiction ... Sometimes the crisscrossing of lives, loves and ideas is confusing but still true to life in its mess and its drama. Other connections point away from the story at hand but create a sense of immersion in the world in which these brilliant people wandered ... At times, though, the detours are distracting ... There is beautiful writing in Figuring, inspired by Popova’s obvious love for words. But sometimes it obscures her meaning ... Popova’s words do enough by themselves.\
