Replaceable you Adventures in human anatomy

Fans of Roach's Stiff and Fuzz will appreciate this book, which examines Americans' obsession with extending their lifespans as long as possible. Entertaining the argument that most body parts can be replaced to better one's livelihood, Roach provides new angles on the squeamish side of stem-cell research and the mechanisms that allow transplants to be delivered (hint: they don't look like the coolers featured on ER dramas). While traveling to interview organ surgeons, she also speaks to techs who reassemble tissue donors' bodies post-harvest and even tests hair-implantation on her own body. Stories about veterans receiving new limbs are juxtaposed with those of older patients who get cataracts removed or hip replacements. Before one dies, Roach concedes, they might wring a bit more joy out of their outer shell by constructing a more able or pain-free body. Roach narrates her own work with a curious, engaging tone. Her book gives listeners a chance to admire how the physical body perseveres--until it can't any longer. VERDICT Combining details that are gory and others that are simply surprising, this captivating audio is a must-listen.--Sharon Sherman

A lively treatise on the human body as an endlessly interchangeable set of parts. It's an old saw (and, these days, canard) that British teeth are bad. All the same, Roach, an indefatigable researcher, turns up a gem at the start of her latest book: Paul McCartney's father once suggested that Paul "have all my teeth taken out and false teeth put in," since he'd likely lose his original set soon enough. Her catalog of cut-and-paste body parts goes on, corporeal trivia mixed with solid, elegantly written scientific journalism. One such part is the nose, none too easy to craft a replacement for, as witness the eminent Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, who lost his original proboscis in a duel. "Occasionally," Roach quotes one biographer as saying of its substitute, "it would drop off." Other appendages await, not least the male member. Given that cataract surgery is now almost assembly-line common, Roach wonders, what about elective surgeries to replace underperforming parts? No, not that part; rather, Roach tells the story of a former Marine who had suffered an injury that led to his toes dragging and thus arranged (by shooting himself in the afflicted foot) for an amputation and refitting with a prosthetic that allowed him to walk more easily. Roach wanders through the hallways of eldritch laboratories where pigs are grown to provide organs that are transplantable to humans, and she visits cadaver labs to look at another source of carefully inventoried parts ("As much time is spent on documentation and shipping of a donor's tissues as on their removal. You're expectingThe Jeffrey Dahmer Story but it's closer to UPS"). She interviews researchers on cures for type 1 diabetes and advances in "in vitro gametogenesis" and generally has a grand time looking into areas where few writers--especially squeamish ones--have ventured. An amiably entertaining, endlessly intriguing stroll through the stuff of which we're made. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.