Life at the Extremes


Frances Ashcroft - 2000
    A sprightly, lavishly illustrated book on the science of human survival.How do people survive extremes of heat, cold, depth, speed and altitude? This book explores the limits of human survival and the physiological adaptations which enable us to exist under extreme conditions. In man’s battle for survival in the harshest of environments, the knowledge imparted by physiology, the ‘logic of life’, is crucial. What causes mountain sickness? Why is it possible to reach the top of Everest without supplementary oxygen, yet be killed if a plane depressurises suddenly at the same altitude. Why are astronauts unable to stand without fainting when they return to Earth? Why do human divers get the bends but sperm whales don’t? Will men always be able to run faster than women? Why don’t penguins get frostbite?

How Not to be a Doctor: And Other Essays


John Launer - 2007
    Taken together, they set out an argument that being a doctor - a real doctor - should mean being able to draw on every aspect of yourself, your interests, and your experiences, however remote these may seem from the medical task of the moment. Originating from the popular columns Launer has written for medical journals over his career, the more than fifty essays cover a range of topics including music, poetry, literature, and psychoanalysis, as well as contemporary medical politics and the personal experiences of being a doctor. From lessons on what they don't teach you in medical school, to a story of the imagined conversation between two prehistoric medical men, to the author's poignant account of being a patient himself as he received treatment for a life-threatening illness, the essays in How Not to Be a Doctor combine erudition with humour, candour, and the human touch. They show how, in medicine, you cannot separate personal experiences from professional ones, in short stories and reflections that will inform and entertain readers on both ends of the stethoscope.

Five Patients


Michael Crichton - 1970
    Michael Crichton created the series from his own experiences as a medical doctor in the emergency rooms, operating rooms and wards of Massachusetts General Hospital. Five Patients is Michael Crichton's true account of the real life dramas so vividly portrayed in ER. A construction worker is seriously injured in a scaffold collapse: a middle-aged dispatcher is brought in suffering from a fever that has reduced him to a delirious wreck; a young man nearly severs his hand in an accident; an airline traveller suffers chest pains; a mother of three is diagnosed with a life-threatening disease.

Flour Water Salt Yeast: The Fundamentals of Artisan Bread and Pizza


Ken Forkish - 2012
    For Portland-based baker Ken Forkish, well-made bread is more than just a pleasure—it is a passion that has led him to create some of the best and most critically lauded breads and pizzas in the country. In Flour Water Salt Yeast, Forkish translates his obsessively honed craft into scores of recipes for rustic boules and Neapolitan-style pizzas, all suited for the home baker. Forkish developed and tested all of the recipes in his home oven, and his impeccable formulas and clear instructions result in top-quality artisan breads and pizzas that stand up against those sold in the best bakeries anywhere. Whether you’re a total beginner or a serious baker, Flour Water Salt Yeast has a recipe that suits your skill level and time constraints: Start with a straight dough and have fresh bread ready by supper time, or explore pre-ferments with a bread that uses biga or poolish. If you’re ready to take your baking to the next level, follow Forkish’s step-by-step guide to making a levain starter with only flour and water, and be amazed by the delicious complexity of your naturally leavened bread. Pizza lovers can experiment with a variety of doughs and sauces to create the perfect pie using either a pizza stone or a cast-iron skillet. Flour Water Salt Yeast is more than just a collection of recipes for amazing bread and pizza—it offers a complete baking education, with a thorough yet accessible explanation of the tools and techniques that set artisan bread apart. Featuring a tutorial on baker’s percentages, advice for manipulating ingredients ratios to create custom doughs, tips for adapting bread baking schedules to fit your day-to-day life, and an entire chapter that demystifies the levain-making process, Flour Water Salt Yeast is an indispensable resource for bakers who want to make their daily bread exceptional bread.

The Norton Anthology of Poetry


Margaret Ferguson - 1970
    The anthology offers more poetry by women (40 new poets), with special attention to early women poets. The book also includes a greater diversity of American poetry, with double the number of poems by African American, Hispanic, native American and Asian American poets. There are 26 new poets representing the Commonwealth literature tradition: now included are more than 37 poets from Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, the Caribbean, South Africa and India.

This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor


Adam Kay - 2017
    Hilarious, horrifying and heartbreaking, this diary is everything you wanted to know – and more than a few things you didn't – about life on and off the hospital ward. As seen on ITV's Zoe Ball Book Club This edition includes extra diary entries and a new afterword by the author.

Confessions of a Surgeon: The Good, the Bad, and the Complicated...Life Behind the O.R. Doors


Paul A. Ruggieri - 2012
    Paul A. Ruggieri has seen the good, the bad, and the ugly of his profession. In Confessions of a Surgeon, he pushes open the doors of the O.R. and reveals the inscrutable place where lives are improved, saved, and sometimes lost. He shares the successes, failures, remarkable advances, and camaraderie that make it exciting. He uncovers the truth about the abusive, exhaustive training and the arduous devotion of his old-school education. He explores the twenty-four-hour challenges that come from patients and their loved ones; the ethics of saving the lives of repugnant criminals; the hot-button issues of healthcare, lawsuits, and reimbursements; and the true cost of running a private practice. And he explains the influence of the white coat code of silence and why patients may never know what really transpires during surgery. Ultimately, Dr. Ruggieri lays bare an occupation that to most is as mysterious and unfamiliar as it is misunderstood. His account is passionate, illuminating, and often shocking-an eye-opening, never- before-seen look at real life, and death, in the O.R.

Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking


Samin Nosrat - 2017
    Chef and writer Samin Nosrat has taught everyone from professional chefs to middle school kids to author Michael Pollan to cook using her revolutionary, yet simple, philosophy. Master the use of just four elements—Salt, which enhances flavor; Fat, which delivers flavor and generates texture; Acid, which balances flavor; and Heat, which ultimately determines the texture of food—and anything you cook will be delicious. By explaining the hows and whys of good cooking, Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat will teach and inspire a new generation of cooks how to confidently make better decisions in the kitchen and cook delicious meals with any ingredients, anywhere, at any time. Echoing Samin’s own journey from culinary novice to award-winning chef, Salt, Fat Acid, Heat immediately bridges the gap between home and professional kitchens. With charming narrative, illustrated walkthroughs, and a lighthearted approach to kitchen science, Samin demystifies the four elements of good cooking for everyone. Refer to the canon of 100 essential recipes—and dozens of variations—to put the lessons into practice and make bright, balanced vinaigrettes, perfectly caramelized roast vegetables, tender braised meats, and light, flaky pastry doughs. Featuring 150 illustrations and infographics that reveal an atlas to the world of flavor by renowned illustrator Wendy MacNaughton, Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat will be your compass in the kitchen. Destined to be a classic, it just might be the last cookbook you’ll ever need. With a foreword by Michael Pollan.

Another Day in the Frontal Lobe: A Brain Surgeon Exposes Life on the Inside


Katrina Firlik - 2006
    She is also a superbly gifted writer–witty, insightful, at once deeply humane and refreshingly wry. In Another Day in the Frontal Lobe, Dr. Firlik draws on this rare combination to create a neurosurgeon’s Kitchen Confidential–a unique insider’s memoir of a fascinating profession.Neurosurgeons are renowned for their big egos and aggressive self-confidence, and Dr. Firlik confirms that timidity is indeed rare in the field. “They’re the kids who never lost at musical chairs,” she writes. A brain surgeon is not only a highly trained scientist and clinician but also a mechanic who of necessity develops an intimate, hands-on familiarity with the gray matter inside our skulls. It’s the balance between cutting-edge medical technology and manual dexterity, between instinct and expertise, that Firlik finds so appealing–and so difficult to master. Firlik recounts how her background as a surgeon’s daughter with a strong stomach and a keen interest in the brain led her to this rarefied specialty, and she describes her challenging, atypical trek from medical student to fully qualified surgeon. Among Firlik’s more memorable cases: a young roofer who walked into the hospital with a three-inch-long barbed nail driven into his forehead, the result of an accident with his partner’s nail gun, and a sweet little seven-year-old boy whose untreated earache had become a raging, potentially fatal infection of the brain lining. From OR theatrics to thorny ethical questions, from the surprisingly primitive tools in a neurosurgeon’s kit to glimpses of future techniques like the “brain lift,” Firlik cracks open medicine’s most prestigious and secretive specialty. Candid, smart, clear-eyed, and unfailingly engaging, Another Day in the Frontal Lobe is a mesmerizing behind-the-scenes glimpse into a world of incredible competition and incalculable rewards.From the Hardcover edition.

The Human Brain Coloring Book


Marian C. Diamond - 1985
    It was developed by internationally recognized neuroscientists and teachers Marian C. Diamond and Arnold B. Scheibel in association with highly acclaimed teacher and anatomist Lawrence M. Elson, creator of Coloring Concepts. This coloring book is designed for a wide range of users: informal learners, students of psychology and the biological sciences, medical, dental, nursing, and other health professional students, and students and workers in the neurosciences. The unique, highly developed coloring process makes this book an effective learning device for such a diverse audience. The material included here represents the state-of-the-art knowledge about the brain and how it works. Each plate of illustrations has been carefully designed to yield maximum information when colored. The accompanying text has been creatively integrated with the coloring process to enhance understanding and retention.

Buzzed: The Straight Facts About the Most Used and Abused Drugs from Alcohol to Ecstasy


Cynthia M. Kuhn - 1998
    It provides information on how drugs enter the body, how they manipulate the brain, their short- & long-term effects, the high they produce & the circumstances in which they can be deadly. psychological & pharmacological research on drugs. Whether the reader is a student confronted by drugs for the first time, an accountant reaching for another cup of coffee, or a health educator, this book aims to provide a clear understanding of how drugs work & the consequences of their use.

Abnormal Psychology


Ronald J. Comer - 1992
    It is that firsthand knowledge of the concerns of students, the complexities of the disorders, and the real struggles of people with psychological disorders that makes Comer's text, Abnormal Psychology, so compelling. This Sixth Edition's new content and features, coupled with new study and teaching tools, all serve to keep the book's portrait of contemporary abnormal psychology as fresh and insightful as ever.

Human Molecular Genetics


Tom Strachan - 1996
    While maintaining the hallmark features of previous editions, the Fourth Edition has been completely updated. It includes new Key Concepts at the beginning of each chapter and annotated further reading at the conclusion of each chapter, to help readers navigate the wealth of information in this subject.The text has been restructured so genomic technologies are integrated throughout, and next generation sequencing is included. Genetic testing, screening, approaches to therapy, personalized medicine, and disease models have been brought together in one section. Coverage of cell biology including stem cells and cell therapy, studying gene function and structure, comparative genomics, model organisms, noncoding RNAs and their functions, and epigenetics have all been expanded.

The Gift of Therapy: An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients


Irvin D. Yalom - 2001
    Yalom imparts his unique wisdom in "The Gift of Therapy." This remarkable guidebook for successful therapy is, as Yalom remarks, "an idiosyncratic mElange of ideas and techniques that I have found useful in my work. These ideas are so personal, opinionated, and occasionally original that the reader is unlikely to encounter them elsewhere. I selected the eighty-five categories in this volume randomly guided by my passion for the task rather than any particular order or system."At once startlingly profound and irresistibly practical, Yalom's insights will help enrich the therapeutic process for a new generation of patients and counselors.

My Own Country: A Doctor's Story


Abraham Verghese - 1994
    Nestled in the Smoky Mountains of eastern Tennessee, the town of Johnson City had always seemed exempt from the anxieties of modern American life. But when the local hospital treated its first AIDS patient, a crisis that had once seemed an urban problem had arrived in the town to stay. Working in Johnson City was Abraham Verghese, a young Indian doctor specializing in infectious diseases. Dr. Verghese became by necessity the local AIDS expert, soon besieged by a shocking number of male and female patients whose stories came to occupy his mind, and even take over his life. Verghese brought a singular perspective to Johnson City: as a doctor unique in his abilities; as an outsider who could talk to people suspicious of local practitioners; above all, as a writer of grace and compassion who saw that what was happening in this conservative community was both a medical and a spiritual emergency."