Book Reviews by Richard Cytowic
Zero Sum: Stories
Author(s): Joyce Carol Oates
Reviewed by Richard Cytowic
“One night the growth detaches from the girl’s scalp and that’s when the story gets really interesting.”
The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue
Author(s): V.E. Schwab
Reviewed by Richard Cytowic
“‘Books, she has found, are a way to live a thousand lives—or to find strength in a very long one.’”
Yours Truly: An Obituary Writer’s Guide to Telling Your Story
Author(s): James P. Hagerty
Reviewed by Richard Cytowic
“My husband of 26 years just died and, ironically, I am reviewing a book about writing obituaries by James Hagerty, the long-time obituary writer for The Wall Street Journal.”
Geiger
Author(s): Gustaf Skörderman
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“First published in Sweden in 2020, the novel is eerily prescient in its depiction of Russian duplicity and ruthlessness. It even has a nasty thing or two to say about Vladimir Putin . . .”
I Was Better Last Night: A Memoir
Author(s): Harvey Fierstein
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“He is that most American of species, the entirely self–made individual. There is nothing like him, never has been, and never will be.”
Dare to Know: A Novel
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“The time of someone’s death doesn’t exist until Sapere Aude calculates it, forcing the waveform to collapse. ‘You do the math, and it makes the math come true.’”
Agatha Christie’s Poirot: The Greatest Detective in the World
Author(s): Mark Aldridge
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Perhaps because Poirot is less a person than principle—a method of detection that is meticulously logical and orderly—he has transitioned easily from print to radio to stage, and from there to screens big and small.”
The Man Who Ate Too Much: The Life of James Beard
Author(s): John Birdsall
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Drinking was a group hobby . . . Food, its accoutrements, and above all the sensuous pleasures of eating formed the leitmotif of his life.”
Author(s): Frank Tallis
The Incurable Romantic: And Other Tales of Madness and Desire
September 17, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“A delicious read about the terrifying, inexorable, and sometimes brutal power of romantic passion—always thrilling, sometimes desperate, shockingly dark.”
Author(s): Chris Bailey
Hyperfocus: How to Be More Productive in a World of Distraction
August 27, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Another book by a productivity guru that aims to help us cope better with daily distractions. The verdict is mixed.”
Author(s): Daniel Z. Lieberman
The Molecule of More: How a Single Chemical in Your Brain Drives Love, Sex, and Creativity―and Will Determine the Fate of the Human Race
August 13, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“An overblown title signals a kitchen-sink approach—too much, too repetitive, too speculative. The molecule of more has taken over judgement and discernment.”
Author(s): Justin J. Lehmiller
Tell Me What You Want: The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life
July 9, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Sexual fantasies are highly self–absorbing. . . .
Author(s): Carl Zimmer
She Has Her Mother’s Laugh: The Powers, Perversions, and Potential of Heredity
May 28, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“If ever a book were to be called magisterial, this one is.
Editor(s): David J. Linden
Think Tank: Forty Neuroscientists Explore the Biological Roots of Human Experience
April 23, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Swiping our smartphones reorganizes the brain’s sensory-motor maps for the hand.
Author(s): Alan Lightman
Searching for Stars on an Island in Maine
March 26, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Do I know too much, or too little?” he asks. Very much an anti-reductionist, when he sees a flock of birds floating on air, he doesn’t think numbers or gravity.
Author(s): Antonio Damasio
The Strange Order of Things: Life, Feeling, and the Making of Cultures
February 4, 2018
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“He takes the reader on a journey from single cells, to nervous systems, to self-conscious, self-directed minds. One can’t fault him for lack of vision or ambition.”
Author(s): Oliver Sacks
The River of Consciousness
October 25, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“It is startling to realize that some of our most cherished memories may never have happened.”
Author(s): David Eagleman
The Runaway Species: How Human Creativity Remakes the World
October 9, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“No other species puts so much effort into exploring imaginary territories, nor does it seem so determined to turn the make-believe into the real.”
Author(s): Matthew Klam
Who Is Rich?: A Novel
July 18, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“A cautionary tale of mining life for one’s art. And of giving one’s fantasies too much free rein.”
Author(s): Charles Spence
Gastrophysics: The New Science of Eating
June 20, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Answering questions you would never have thought to ask, Charles Spence reveals how eating and taste have everything to do with the brain and almost nothing to do with the tongue.”
Author(s): Gwendolyn Womack
The Fortune Teller: A Novel
June 11, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Another tale by Womack that can’t be put down. Superb storytelling. Rounded characters. Stakes worth killing—or dying—for. This is summer reading for every season.”
Author(s): David Byrne
How Music Works
May 10, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Byrne touches on a broad array of forces that influence and shape the musical experience—from how it is created, performed, recorded, and distributed to more personally meaningful aspects
Author(s): Jean-Pierre Isbouts
Young Leonardo: The Evolution of a Revolutionary Artist, 1472–1499
May 8, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“A corrective look at Leonardo’s first 27 professional years when he was snubbed, struggled, and departed Florence thwarted and penniless.”
Author(s): Adrian Plass
The Shadow Doctor
April 12, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“We are only charged with loving people. The rest is not our responsibility.
Author(s): Richard Yonck
Heart of the Machine: Our Future in a World of Artificial Emotional Intelligence
March 6, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Why are futurists so often wrong, and why do we even listen to them given their poor track record?”
Author(s): Damion Searls
The Inkblots: Hermann Rorschach, His Iconic Test, and the Power of Seeing
February 21, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“What might this be?” Such an innocuous question—such profound results. No psychological concept has penetrated culture as much as “the Inkblot test” has.
Author(s): Sarah Pinborough
Behind Her Eyes: A Novel
January 30, 2017
Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“An engaging suspense thriller despite its major gaffe in the ending’s twist. Novel in its concept and construction, this is one unsettling book.”
Author(s): Federico Axat
Kill the Next One
December 23, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Move over Hitchcock, P. D. James, Ruth Rendell, and more. Here is a thriller to make others fade.
Author(s): David Sax
The Revenge of Analog: Real Things and Why They Matter
November 28, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“What makes a tool superior to another . . . has nothing to do with how new it is. What matters is how it enlarges or diminishes us.“
Author(s): Philip Dean Walker
At Danceteria and Other Stories
November 14, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Walker’s stories intersect the tipping point when big city gay life went from carefree hedonism and glitzy self–indulgence to the moment when self–satisfied habitués of the demi–monde bega
Author(s): Roger Rosenblatt
Thomas Murphy: A Novel
October 3, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Everyone is disabled. Love exists for our disabilities. And forgotten things, though they remain forgotten, have a life of their own.”
Author(s): Nicholas Carr
Utopia Is Creepy: And Other Provocations
September 20, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“. . . Carr’s best hits for those who missed the last decade of his stream of thoughtful commentary about our love affair with technology and its effect on our relationships . . .”
Author(s): Daniel J. Levitin
A Field Guide to Lies: Critical Thinking in the Information Age
September 6, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Daniel Levitin wants us to eat our spinach, an unsavory chore for an increasingly innumerate society.”
Author(s): Lily Brooks-Dalton
Good Morning, Midnight: A Novel
August 26, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“A debut novel with an intriguing premise. . . . What is left when everything is gone? What does it mean to be alive in the universe and the grandeur of vast emptiness?”
Author(s): Alan Glynn
Paradime: A Novel
August 1, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“What a fun book this is. The plot moves. It twists. What we fear will happen does happen. Then unexpected complications set in.
Author(s): Dana I. Wolff
The Prisoner of Hell Gate: A Novel [Review II]
July 4, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Don’t read this book if you live alone in a remote cabin. Don’t read it if you whistle in the dark to settle your nerves. Its creepiness will unsettle you but good.”
Author(s): Cass R. Sunstein
The World According to Star Wars
May 27, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
Why does Star Wars speak to billions? Studio heads hated it. The actors thought it ridiculous. George Lucas feared catastrophe.
Author(s): Erika Christakis
The Importance of Being Little: What Preschoolers Really Need from Grownups
February 8, 2016 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“What she describes is the end of childhood as we once knew it.”
Author(s): Marcos Lutyens
Memoirs of a Hypnotist: 100 Days
December 1, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“An art installation that challenges [and shows] that preconceptions are the enemy of new ideas.“
Author(s): Bob Mankoff
How About Never—Is Never Good for You?: My Life in Cartoons
October 5, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“If you want to win The New Yorker cartoon caption contest, read this book. Read it, too, for a behind-the-scenes peek at the enterprise that makes us smile.”
Author(s): Guy Claxton
Intelligence in the Flesh: Why Your Mind Needs Your Body Much More Than It Thinks
September 21, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“We neglect our bodies because we underestimate their intelligence . . .”
Author(s): Mary Karr
The Art of Memoir
September 14, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“A beautiful and unstinting look at the inner thoughts and difficult choices made by writers who dig past the false self to confront a truer, more honest version of themselves.”
Author(s): Abel Debritto
Charles Bukowski on Writing
August 26, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“It helps for readers to have a taste for the quirky, the offbeat, and the unusual.”
Author(s): Christopher J. Yates
Black Chalk
August 3, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“So many years suppressing a secret . . . In the end, the mechanism of the Game proved irrelevant.” Which also goes for this disappointing book.
Author(s): Jean-Christophe Rufin
The Red Collar
August 2, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“A modern parable about loyalty to others, fidelity to one’s convictions, and the self-effacement needed to bear the consequences of living by one’s beliefs.”
Author(s): Gwendolyn Womack
The Memory Painter: A Novel of Love and Reincarnation
May 9, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“The first pages grab the reader with images of half-remembered lives that struggle to hold on to what they imagine is their identity.”
Author(s): Kory Floyd
The Loneliness Cure: Six Strategies for Finding Real Connections in Your Life
May 5, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Solitude has; loneliness wants. It isn’t about being alone, but about missing significant connections that feed our need to belong.”
Author(s): Josh Cohen
The Private Life: Our Everyday Self in an Age of Intrusion
April 13, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“What you say and what the other hears won’t coincide. There are gaps between . . . what we say and what we mean.”
Author(s): Jennifer Weiner
All Fall Down: A Novel
April 6, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“How glibly addicts deceive themselves.”
Author(s): Matthew B. Crawford
The World Beyond Your Head: On Becoming an Individual in an Age of Distraction
March 30, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“The lack of direct immersion and the increasing rarity of actual face-to-face interactions are the true cause of our anomie . . .
Author(s): Gretchen Rubin
Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives
March 28, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“will her recipe that combines research, personal anecdotes, and social media feedback prove superior to existing advice, or will it fall like a failed soufflé?”
Author(s): Matt Richtel
The Doomsday Equation: A Novel
February 25, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“The algorithm was the equivalent of giving the world a blood test, taking its temperature, assessing its mood.”
Author(s): Susan Greenfield
Mind Change: How Digital Technologies Are Leaving Their Mark on Our Brains
February 15, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Anything we practice repeatedly changes the brain; fixate on iPhones and similar screens, and we become better at staying helplessly glued to them.”
Author(s): Eleanor Lerman
Radiomen
January 30, 2015 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“There was something really interesting going on somewhere just beyond the edges of what our eyes could see.”
Author(s): Alan Barclay PhD
The Ultimate Guide to Sugars and Sweeteners
December 14, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Just in time to address those extra holiday pounds comes a practical guide to natural sugars and artificial sweeteners that explodes some long-held myths along the way.”
Author(s): Charles Spence, Betina Piqueras- Fiszman
The Perfect Meal: The Multisensory Science of Food and Dining
December 2, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Taste happens in our head, not in our mouth, and the art of the table today is as robust as it was in the 18th century.”
Editor(s): Gary Marcus, Jeremy Freeman
The Future of the Brain
November 24, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Fast computers coupled with biological knowledge can let us understand the workings of a wedge of actual brain tissue. The progress from measurement to meaning feels palpable.”
Author(s): William Powers
New Slow City: Living Simply in the World’s Fastest City
November 16, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“If you wear clogs, recycle diapers, and think it is fun to live in a hovel then this book is for you. Otherwise, the going is iffy.”
Author(s): Emily St. John Mandel
Station Eleven
September 8, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“A deeply felt story of human survival; of friendship that endures and abides the twists of fate; and the ability to see beauty in the world as it is, no matter what degradation of the planet or the people on it.”
Author(s):
The Organized Mind
August 22, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Our minds were designed to succeed in an environment utterly unlike the information overload we now face. As for common sense, how can opposites attract but birds of a feather flock together?”
Author(s): Jennie Rooney
Red Joan
July 2, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“For some readers the science of Red Joan will resonate; for others, the politics will hold their interest; others still will find both story lines equally thrilling. Characters are complex and well drawn, and the author lets us in on their convictions, prejudices, and doubts.”
Author(s): Eric–Emmanuel Schmitt
Invisible Love
June 30, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“What a delight when a writer hits his target as deftly and with such beauty as Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt does in Invisible Love.”
Author(s): Sally Beauman
The Visitors: A Novel
June 30, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“An eyewitness to the discovery of Tutankhamun, but also to a secret hidden for decades: That Lord Carnarvon broke into the tomb before the official opening and removed articles for his personal ‘pocket’ collection.”
Author(s): Paul Taylor
The Next America: Boomers, Millennials, and the Looming Generational Showdown
March 4, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Generations are more different from each other now than at any time in living memory. The multigenerational household now sees boomers and boomerangers living under the same roof as they once did in the 1940s and 1950s.”
Author(s): Ellis Leyne
Wicked Gods
February 20, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“In this book religion is actually the MacGuffin, the object in a suspense story that sets up the plot and keeps the chain of events in motion . .
Author(s): Patricia S. Churchland
Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain
February 17, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“The world is a better place for Dr. Churchland’s efforts and her curiosity.”
Author(s): Nicholas Epley
Mindwise: How We Understand What Others Think, Believe, Feel, and Want
February 13, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“. . . about the innate knack everyone has to reason about the minds of others. . . .
Author(s): Joe Nelms
The Last Time I Died
January 18, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“How this book is supposed to impress intelligent readers is only something that publicity managers can imagine.”
Author(s): Alan Lightman
The Accidental Universe: The World You Thought You Knew
January 17, 2014 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“We are not observers on the outside looking in. We are on the inside too.”
Author(s): Jason Padgett, Maureen Anne Seaberg
Struck by Genius: How a Brain Injury Made Me a Mathematical Marvel
December 30, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Everything we can touch and all that we are is made of the most beautiful geometric patterns.”
Author(s): Nicholas Delbanco
The Art of Youth: Crane, Carrington, Gershwin, and the Nature of First Acts
November 18, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“To live one’s life as an artist is to dream of immortality.”
Author(s): Uri Gneezy, John A. List
The Why Axis
October 8, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Until one understands what incentives motive people, it is impossible to predict how new policies will actually work.”
Author(s): Jonathan Grimwood
The Last Banquet
September 30, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Our lives are built almost entirely on a foundation of events colliding.”
Author(s): Dana Goodyear
Anything That Moves: Renegade Chefs, Fearless Eaters, and the Making of a New American Food Culture
September 3, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“. . . that works out to a hell of a lot of insect parts we are already eating without knowing it.”
Author(s): Roger Rosenblatt
The Boy Detective: A New York Childhood
August 30, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Everyone dwells in one past or another, and to a greater or lesser extent, is ruled by it.”
Author(s): Richard Dawkins
An Appetite for Wonder: The Making of a Scientist
August 9, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“. . . delivers nothing close to an understanding of how [Dawkins] came to be the popular scientist . . .”
Author(s): Larry Niven, Matthew Joseph Harrington
The Goliath Stone
May 21, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“The Goliath Stone is brain candy, a fast read, and surely a sci-fi fan pleaser. Good for the beach or the hammock.”
Author(s): Writers of SciLance
The Science Writers’ Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Pitch, Publish, and Prosper in the Digital Age
April 16, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“Writing is the second most solitary occupation.”
Author(s): Temple, Panek, Richard Grandin
The Autistic Brain: Thinking Across the Spectrum
March 23, 2013 Reviewed by: Richard Cytowic
“. . . of enormous service to the millions of autistic individuals . . .