"On Immunity" by Eula Biss is a collection of passages the author had to say on a wide ride of subjects: from the history of medicine and childbirth to why kids should or should not be vaccinated. In those bite-sized pieces, the author tried to collect all the information she’s gathered on the issues that interested her or related to her path as a young mother.
The book cover has a badge “The New York Times bestseller” on it, and 2 pages full of excited and praising reviews. I had, frankly, very high expectations of the book because of that. As I got further and further into the book, I was getting more and more confused. I know that it’s impossible for absolutely everyone to utterly like a book or a movie, and, unfortunately, this particular book didn’t work out for me.
Those little “chapters” in the book are scattered all over the place, and it’s hard to put them on a certain timeline. The author tells a story of how she gave birth to her first child, managing the anxieties and issues that come with being a mother for the first time. One of the most important things for newborns is to get vaccinated, and that sparked her to get deeper into this issue. Some “chapters” give an insight into the history of modern medicine—particularly related to vaccination and disease prevention. Some stories provide some interesting facts, only facts, in bits and pieces, but fail to tell the whole story of how vaccines became what they are today. I have read a book describing this fascinating story (an absolutely incredible read that I finished in one night, “Medicine's 10 Greatest Discoveries” by Meyer Friedman, Gerald W. Friedland M.D.), and this book doesn’t compare. Some other chapters are just completely unrelatable stories from her own experiences, awkwardly tied to the whole narrative “about immunity.” The chapters that relate to modern controversies around vaccination today do not provide any detailed insight into the issue and just vaguely describes these events, and the whole approach just feels lazy. In the very beginning, and also later on, Ms. Biss talks about Greek myths and various metaphors we use to describe immunity. She also cites Dracula, Voltaire, and how the topic of disease and immunology has shown throughout popular culture and literature. That is, indeed, a very interesting approach, but again, the author is, unfortunately, only scratching the surface. It is discussed in much more detail in the book I mentioned above. All these stories, thoughts, history, old and modern are mixed together in a completely random order, which makes it hard to read.
Another thing I wanted to mention is that it is written by a person with no scientific and/or medical background, and that makes it very accessible to any reader. I would say, however, that this general lack of expertise makes the book feel less credible and more simply based on anecdotal evidence.
I turned to the Internet in my search for answers, and a lot of people felt extremely enthusiastic about the book: it was endorsed by Bill Gates and The New York Times, and I just couldn’t understand where all the enthusiasm came from. I’m a very avid supporter of vaccination and vaccine research, so it’s not just me disagreeing with the author, I just feel like it’s very poorly put together. Like I already mentioned, in a book that I’ve read before, the topic is excellently covered in much more detail that is out in a great narrative, and it’s just a tenth of it. This book feels like a collection of random thoughts on the topic the author decided to write down and publish.
I really deeply enjoyed this book, it part because of the formatting. Biss writes in the way that a lot of people think- in metaphors and broken up into little chunks. I don’t think this was intended to be a comprehensive explaination of vaccination, but rather a sympathetic view into the minds of those who ask if immunization is the right choice. In a debate that is often riddled with cold statistics and unrelatable characters, she offers a human perspective. Here, I think the value is more in the storytelling than in the hard facts.
ReplyDeleteI understand your point of view, and it is definitely valid and, it looks like, dominant. And I respect that. Like I said, it's impossible for every single person to like a book or a movie. As I mentioned in the post, I had really high expectations of the book, and I'd say that a part of the reason why I didn't like it is because I have, so to speak, a different "reading portfolio," and just a different idea of what a book like this should look like. But again, that is just my personal opinion.
DeleteI agree with Julia's perspective on the book. I think the value in Biss's perspective is that of a new mother. She is giving s insight into person's real time thoughts and concerns about a variety of medical topics particularly vaccines.
ReplyDeleteFor me, the "little chapters" are the highlights of the book. The mother's insight is not appealing to me at all, while I quite enjoy looking at vaccination through the lenses of sociologists, politicians, culture critics and the media.
ReplyDeleteTo an extent, I agree with what you are saying. However, I think it depends on your expectations going into the book. If you want an in-depth, scientific, informative and to the point... this is not the book to be reading. I usually read scientific books and so I think that's why I don't like this book because of how information is scattered. But I'm realizing that's not the point of the book, it's to show the struggle of a mother that is surrounded by differing opinions and the scattered information represents the scattered bits and pieces you slowly collect when researching a topic like this. But yes, definitely not a good book to read if you want to really learn about vaccinations and what not. It's more of a story-type book.
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