I’ve been catching up with John Riutta’s recent book reviews on The Well-read Naturalist. I read all of his book reviews even those that are rather local to his part of the world, of northern Oregon. I read them because they are so thoughtful and so well written. I sometimes feel I’d rather read John’s book reviews than the books themselves.
John’s fairly recent review of The Cat: a natural and cultural history by Sarah Brown is a case in point – I enjoyed the review but I’m not that interested in cats and so won’t be rushing to the book itself – but you might feel differently.
John also reviews The Province of Affliction: illness and the making of early New England by Ben Mutshcler which, on the face of it, sounds like something that is too distant and too detailed to be of much interest to me but having read John’s review I can imagine reading this book. At a time of coronavirus it is surely pertinent to think back to the European settlers, with no Obamacare let alone an NHS, in a world with poor understanding of what caused or cured illnesses, and think of what illness would mean to their lives. We’re all doing more of that at the moment – maybe a book for the monthlong coming lockdown in England?
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