The Cancer Chronicles Pdf Summary
When the woman he loved was diagnosed with a metastatic cancer, science writer George Johnson embarked on a journey to learn everything he could about the disease and the people who dedicate their lives to understanding and combating it. What he discovered is a revolution under way—an explosion of new ideas about what cancer really is and where it comes from. In a provocative and intellectually vibrant exploration, he takes us on an adventure through the history and recent advances of cancer research that will challenge everything you thought you knew about the disease.
Deftly excavating and illuminating decades of investigation and analysis, he reveals what we know and don’t know about cancer, showing why a cure remains such a slippery concept. We follow him as he combs through the realms of epidemiology, clinical trials, laboratory experiments, and scientific hypotheses—rooted in every discipline from evolutionary biology to game theory and physics. Cogently extracting fact from a towering canon of myth and hype, he describes tumors that evolve like alien creatures inside the body, paleo-oncologists who uncover petrified tumors clinging to the skeletons of dinosaurs and ancient human ancestors, and the surprising reversals in science’s comprehension of the causes of cancer, with the foods we eat and environmental toxins playing a lesser role. Perhaps most fascinating of all is how cancer borrows natural processes involved in the healing of a wound or the unfolding of a human embryo and turns them, jujitsu-like, against the body.
Throughout his pursuit, Johnson clarifies the human experience of cancer with elegiac grace, bearing witness to the punishing gauntlet of consultations, surgeries, targeted therapies, and other treatments. He finds compassion, solace, and community among a vast network of patients and professionals committed to the fight and wrestles to comprehend the cruel randomness cancer metes out in his own family. For anyone whose life has been affected by cancer and has found themselves asking why?, this book provides a new understanding. In good company with the works of Atul Gawande, Siddhartha Mukherjee, and Abraham Verghese, The Cancer Chronicles is endlessly surprising and as radiant in its prose as it is authoritative in its eye-opening science.
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The Cancer Chronicles Review
5.0 out of 5 stars Don’t let the statistics frighten yoReviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 20, 2014
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Last year my middle sister was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, and my youngest sister and I have both survived bouts with breast cancer. Our mother died of lung cancer. But one thing this book taught me is not to be afraid of statistics, especially the government’s cancer incidence and mortality rates. You will need to read “The Cancer Chronicles” yourself to see what I mean, but to roughly summarize one specific category: no one really knows for sure how the foods we eat affect our likelihood of getting cancer. There are some strong statistical links such as the one between smoking and lung cancer, but others seem to evaporate under scrutiny such as the supposed link between cell phone usage and brain cancer.
George Johnson, one of my favorite science writers, takes us all the way back to world’s oldest definitive diagnosis of a cancer that had invaded the bone of a dinosaur. One of the more interesting discussions in the chapter on ‘Jurassic Cancer’ is the lack of correlation between body size and cancer. Nor does cancer correlate well with metabolic rate: “Birds, despite their frenzied metabolic rate (a hummingbird’s heart can beat more than a thousand times a minute) appear to get very little cancer. If you graph mammalian size against cancer rate there is no telltale sloping line, just a scattering of dots.”
This excellent overview of a complex subject took on a very personal meaning to the author, when he learned that his wife, Nancy had “metastatic cancer with an unknown primary.” She was later diagnosed with a stage four uterine papillary serous carcinoma, and Johnson takes us on a tour of the circles of hell that constitute modern-day cancer treatment. Although his wife eventually recovered, his brother was the next to be diagnosed with cancer: squamous cell carcinoma.
In spite of his own personal involvement with this dread disease, the author ends “The Cancer Chronicles” on an upbeat note: “Inside my body, 10 trillion cells (these tiny Maxwell’s demons) are in the same inevitable slump toward entropy…There are no instructions. Somehow it all just works. And when it doesn’t we rage against the machine.”
5.0 out of 5 stars Informative, interesting, and heartbreaking
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 26, 2013
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It is an unfortunate fact of life that most, if not all, of us will know someone who is diagnosed with cancer during our lifetime. This is often the first step on a terrifying medical journey characterized by searing emotion and fear; one that is further complicated by a hurricane of scientific and medical facts upon which major decisions must be based. With this book, Johnson deftly handles both angles. He provides a personal account of his experiences with loved ones’ diagnoses as well as summarizing the science related to each phase in the fight against cancer.
This book is incredibly well-researched when it comes to the scientific information about cancer and the state of cancer research. At the same time, you can sense the frustration of all those who are touched by this disease–the patients, the healthcare professionals, and the scientists. For example, it seems that every day we learn that something “causes” cancer or something “prevents” cancer. Johnson delves into these areas with the intention of sorting it out for the reader, and does an excellent job of explaining why things are rarely as cut-and-dried as they may first appear. He alternates the scientific aspects with the personal experience–the fear, the heartbreak, the adjustment of expectations in daily life, and as such is able to capture the broader implications of this disease on our society.
To include both sides of experience with cancer–both the individual feelings as well as the scientific underpinnings, is a difficult endeavor that Johnson somehow manages with great warmth and compassion. I highly recommend this book to just about anyone.
5.0 out of 5 stars Making sense of cancer
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 4, 2013
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Is it possible to enjoy something that’s so deadly? I truly enjoyed this book! Mr. Johnson’s personal experiences are compelling. I thank him for sharing those experiences along with the results of his extensive research. It’s fascinating to read about cancer in archaeology. Mr. Johnson starts with the very distant past but quickly brings us up to date on today’s treatments and potential areas of future research.
For those of us confronting cancer (and who isn’t?), this book helps makes sense of the whole experience and disease, especially for us non-scientists.
The book is ideal for anyone who might take comfort in understanding cancer better, even if that understanding doesn’t lead to “hope.” This is not a book about how to cope with treatment or offering miraculous not-yet-reported-on cures. There is no sugar-coating. It simply explains, in rather wonderful prose, the science behind cancer, why it’s so darned difficult to cure, and why prevention may remain elusive.
My only disappointment was that Mr. Johnson didn’t mention the work of T. Colin Campbell at Cornell, whose studies showed that at least some cancer is fueled by animal protein in the diet (protein, not fat, in dairy products). Dr. Campbell’s latest book “Whole” also gets into the politics and profits behind cancer research — and why, perhaps, prevention is not at hand. Both Mr. Johnson’s and Mr. Campbell’s books will help enlighten a public that’s normally at the mercy of media sound bites.
About George Johnson Author Of The Cancer Chronicles pdf Book
George Johnson (born January 20, 1952) Author Of The Cancer Chronicles pdf Book is an American journalist and science writer. He is the author of a number of books, including The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments (2008) and Strange Beauty: Murray Gell-Mann and the Revolution in 20th-Century Physics (1999), and writes for a number of publications, including The New York Times.
He is one of the co-hosts (with science writer John Horgan) of “Science Saturday”, a weekly discussion on the website Bloggingheads.tv, related to topics in science. Several prominent scientists, philosophers, and bloggers have been interviewed for the site.
The Cancer Chronicles pdf, Paperback, Hardcover Book Information
- Publisher : Knopf; 1st edition (August 27, 2013)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 304 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0307595145
- ISBN-13 : 978-0307595140
- Item Weight : 1.01 pounds
- Dimensions : 5.8 x 1.1 x 8.5 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #2,553,996 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,906 in Oncology (Books)
- #3,019 in History of Medicine (Books)
- #10,535 in History & Philosophy of Science (Books)
- Customer Reviews: 4.2 out of 5 stars 114 ratings
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