BILL BRYSON's bestselling books include A Walk in the Woods, Notes from a Small Island, I'm A Stranger Here Myself, In a Sunburned Country, A Short History of Nearly Everything (which earned him the 2004 Aventis Prize), The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, At Home, and One Summer. He lives in England with his wife.
"Glorious. . .Having described the physical nature of our world and
beyond, from the atomic to the intergalactic, in The
Body [Bryson] now turns inward to explain—in his lucid,
amusing style—what we’re made of. . .Astonishing . .Draws on dozens
of experts and a couple hundred books to carry the reader from
outside to inside, from up to down and from miraculous operational
efficiencies to malignant mayhem when things go awry. . .You will
marvel at the brilliance and vast weirdness of your
design." —The Washington Post
"Delightful. . .Reveals the thousands of rarely acknowledged
tasks our body takes care of as we go about our day. .
.Informative, entertaining and often gross (kissing, according to
one study, transfers up to one billion bacteria from one mouth to
another, along with 0.2 micrograms of food bits). . . Bryson, who
gives off a Cronkite-like trustworthy vibe, is good at allaying
fears and busting myths.” —A.J. Jacobs, The New York Times
Book Review
"Mr. Bryson’s latest book is a Baedeker of the human body, a
fact-studded survey of our physiques, inside and out. Many authors
have produced such guides in recent years, and some of them are
very good. But none have done it quite so well as Mr. Bryson, who
writes better, is more amusing and has greater mastery of his
material than anyone else. . .[He] is a master explainer, with a
gift for the pithy simile and all-encompassing metaphor. . .[His]
love of language is often on display, and he can’t resist
occasional indulgences on the origins of terms medical and
anatomical. . .Mr. Bryson’s account is enlivened by his excellent
command of the history of medicine. . .Brisk, provocative and
entertaining throughout." —The Wall Street Journal
"Fascinating." —NPR
"Bryson launches himself into the wilderness of the human anatomy
armed with his characteristic thoroughness and wit. He ably
dissects the knowns and unknowns of how we live and
die and all the idiosyncrasies of our shared infrastructure. .
.This book is full of such arresting factoids and, like a douser
hunting water, Bryson is adept at finding the bizarre and the
arcane in his subject matter. . .Amazing." —USA
Today
"A witty, informative immersion. . .The Body—a delightful,
anecdote-propelled read—proves one of his most ambitious yet, as he
leads us on a head-to-toe tour of a physique that’s terra incognita
to many of us. . .Playful, lucid. . .[Bryson] cover[s] a remarkably
large swathe of human corporeal and cerebral experience." —The
Boston Globe
"A directory of wonders. . .Extraordinary. . . A tour of the
minuscule; it aims to do for the human body what his A Short
History of Nearly Everything did for science. . .The prose
motors gleefully along, a finely tuned engine running on jokes,
factoids and biographical interludes. . .Wry, companionable,
avuncular and always lucid . . .[The Body] could stand as an
ultimate prescription for life." —The Guardian
"A delightful tour guide. . .Bryson's stroll through human anatomy,
physiology, evolution, and illness (diabetes, cancer, infections)
is instructive, accessible, and
entertaining." —Booklist, starred review
"Amusingly informative." —Forbes
"A pleasing, entertaining sojourn into the realm of what makes us
tick." —Kirkus Reviews
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