Breath Taking

Good Information On Facts, But Get A Second Opinion On Recommendations. This is a book about the origins and history of lung medicine, by a doc specializing in lung medicine. And because of that very nature, on facts it is quite remarkable. Stephen details everything from the evolution of the lung to the various ailments of it, focusing the last couple of chapters on Cystic Fibrosis in particular, and does so in a very understandable manner. Ultimately this is a prime example of the Flight Director Principle though, where one should absolutely listen to subject matter experts on their subjects... and consider the implications on other systems - particularly in conjunction with experts on those other systems - when this particular subject matter expert makes recommendations that impact other systems. And that is where getting a second opinion will be most useful in this particular tale, as many of Stephen's recommendations outside of lung medicine specifically could very likely be problematic at best. Still, only a single star deduction as largely your mileage is going to vary there based more on how you feel about his particular recommendations in those realms. Truly and enlightening read, and very much recommended.

Wide-ranging in scope: a pre-prehistory of how we ended up with free oxygen in our atmosphere; leading to a prehistory of how animals evolved lungs; then a history of how/when we learned what we know about breathing and the lungs; and an overwhelming catalog of lung pathologies, including cases from the author's own practice. Side detours into comparative anatomy (bird lungs are really cool!), the politics of clean air, the greed of scummy tobacco companies and profit-driven big pharma. Enjoyable but in a detached sort of way: very easy to put down for a while. Informative in places but, having just finished it, I'm struggling to recall anything I really learned (except for bird lungs. Those are cool.)

Written before COVID, with three pages hastily added at publication time (around April 2020) so there's absolutely nothing useful or interesting about it. Too bad, but hey, it might mean a revised second edition in a few years.