#48 [2025/CBR17] Replaceable You by Mary Roach

Although it's been a number of years since I've read a book by Mary Roach, I have read quite a few. Mary Roach writes non-fiction--digging into whatever topic seems to catch her fancy. Quite often this topic is at least a little bit taboo. She's written a book about sex (Bonk), death (Stiff), and ghosts (Spook). When I was told her latest book was coming out, I immediately put a hold on it at the library. 

Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy (2025) is Roach's latest book. I thought it was interesting, and I definitely learned some things, but I didn't find it quite as readable as I have some of her other books. I have discovered about myself that whatever subject I'm learning about, I prefer to really dig into it, understand it fully, and explore every corner. Replaceable You (and many of Roach's books) keeps it fast paced, jumping from topic to topic with witticisms and little jokes. It can be fun, but I found myself getting frustrated. 

Roach tackles a number of different subjects in Replaceable You, including: the history of building fake noses, skin grafting, using pig organs for humans, growing organs, repurposing sexual organs, prosthetic legs, the iron lung, ostomy bags, hair transplants, and more. The overarching theme is an acknowledgement of how complex the human body is, and how difficult a time we have when we try to create part of it ourselves. It is amazing what some doctors have accomplished, but I'm a little afraid that we're walking ourselves right into a harrowing science-fiction movie.

My favorite parts of the book were when Roach showed how the research affected people personally. I enjoyed learning about the woman who wanted a prosthetic over her real foot because her original was so damaged. I also found the chapter on ostomy bags pretty interesting. I had never really thought about the stigma and challenge of trying to live your life with an ostomy bag. Finally, the chapter on the woman who had used an iron lung at night for most of her life was both fascinating and unexpectedly heart wrenching. 

There was a fair bit of information about the use of animals in all this research, including growing pig organs for humans and more. I am not against all animal testing. I realize that it has helped countless people's lives, but it still makes me uncomfortable, and I didn't enjoy reading about some of it. I also occasionally had a hard time following some of the more advanced research. Again, I felt like I needed more explanation to really understand what was going on and how much more needed to be done before it became something that was medically useable. 

Fans of Mary Roach will almost certainly enjoy this book as well, although I didn't find it as readable as some of her others.