An eye-opening biological journey.
Delving into the mysteries of a woman’s body.
A few years ago, when she was suffering from a recurring vaginal infection, journalist Gross, former digital science editor at Smithsonian, realized she knew very little about her own body, particularly her reproductive organs. Aiming to rectify that huge gap in her knowledge, she set out to investigate. Soon, though, she discovered that women’s bodies long have been seen as an enigma to scientists, physicians, and psychiatrists. Instead of producing a “fun and jaunty” book about the vagina, the author makes a lively debut with a fresh, informative examination of women’s entire reproductive system, melding medical history—beginning in Hippocrates’ Greece—with a wide range of interviews and biological sleuthing in research laboratories all over the world. Throughout history, Gross reports, medicine has privileged men’s bodies over women’s. “It was only in 1993,” she writes, “following the women’s health movement, that a federal mandate required researchers to include women and minorities in clinical research.” Even then, research focused mostly on fertility, excluding the many other health issues that women face. Women’s biology, though, has generated much recent scientific interest, which Gross conveys with enthusiasm and clarity through her conversations with gynecologists, bacteriologists, urologists, medical anthropologists, and surgeons. The author also talked with a host of women—some, for example, who were victims of genital cutting and some who have undergone reconstruction of that excision; women suffering from endometriosis and vaginal infections; women born with atypical genitalia who were surgically altered as infants; some undergoing hormone therapy and gender affirmation surgery to transition as women. In graphic detail, Gross explains the complex structure of the clitoris; the particular microbiome of the vagina; the biology of egg cells, ovaries, and the uterus. She also devotes a chapter to transgender women and the pioneering surgeons who treat them. Veve’s illustrations—more Salvador Dalí than Georgia O’Keeffe—impart a sense of disquieting wonder to Gross’ brisk reporting.
An eye-opening biological journey.Pub Date: March 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-324-00631-2
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: Dec. 20, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2022
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.
The chef, rapper, and TV host serves up a blustery memoir with lashings of self-help.
“I’ve always had a sick confidence,” writes Bronson, ne Ariyan Arslani. The confidence, he adds, comes from numerous sources: being a New Yorker, and more specifically a New Yorker from Queens; being “short and fucking husky” and still game for a standoff on the basketball court; having strength, stamina, and seemingly no fear. All these things serve him well in the rough-and-tumble youth he describes, all stickball and steroids. Yet another confidence-builder: In the big city, you’ve got to sink or swim. “No one is just accepted—you have to fucking show that you’re able to roll,” he writes. In a narrative steeped in language that would make Lenny Bruce blush, Bronson recounts his sentimental education, schooled by immigrant Italian and Albanian family members and the mean streets, building habits good and bad. The virtue of those habits will depend on your take on modern mores. Bronson writes, for example, of “getting my dick pierced” down in the West Village, then grabbing a pizza and smoking weed. “I always smoke weed freely, always have and always will,” he writes. “I’ll just light a blunt anywhere.” Though he’s gone through the classic experiences of the latter-day stoner, flunking out and getting arrested numerous times, Bronson is a hard charger who’s not afraid to face nearly any challenge—especially, given his physique and genes, the necessity of losing weight: “If you’re husky, you’re always dieting in your mind,” he writes. Though vulgar and boastful, Bronson serves up a model that has plenty of good points, including his growing interest in nature, creativity, and the desire to “leave a legacy for everybody.”
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4478-5
Page Count: 184
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 5, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
An absorbing, wide-ranging story of humans’ relationship with the water.
A study of swimming as sport, survival method, basis for community, and route to physical and mental well-being.
For Bay Area writer Tsui (American Chinatown: A People's History of Five Neighborhoods, 2009), swimming is in her blood. As she recounts, her parents met in a Hong Kong swimming pool, and she often visited the beach as a child and competed on a swim team in high school. Midway through the engaging narrative, the author explains how she rejoined the team at age 40, just as her 6-year-old was signing up for the first time. Chronicling her interviews with scientists and swimmers alike, Tsui notes the many health benefits of swimming, some of which are mental. Swimmers often achieve the “flow” state and get their best ideas while in the water. Her travels took her from the California coast, where she dove for abalone and swam from Alcatraz back to San Francisco, to Tokyo, where she heard about the “samurai swimming” martial arts tradition. In Iceland, she met Guðlaugur Friðþórsson, a local celebrity who, in 1984, survived six hours in a winter sea after his fishing vessel capsized, earning him the nickname “the human seal.” Although humans are generally adapted to life on land, the author discovered that some have extra advantages in the water. The Bajau people of Indonesia, for instance, can do 10-minute free dives while hunting because their spleens are 50% larger than average. For most, though, it’s simply a matter of practice. Tsui discussed swimming with Dara Torres, who became the oldest Olympic swimmer at age 41, and swam with Kim Chambers, one of the few people to complete the daunting Oceans Seven marathon swim challenge. Drawing on personal experience, history, biology, and social science, the author conveys the appeal of “an unflinching giving-over to an element” and makes a convincing case for broader access to swimming education (372,000 people still drown annually).
An absorbing, wide-ranging story of humans’ relationship with the water.Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-61620-786-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Algonquin
Review Posted Online: Jan. 4, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
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