Reviews tagging 'Slavery'

The Icepick Surgeon: Murder, Fraud, Sabotage, Piracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetuated in the Name of Science by Sam Kean

22 reviews

bibrarian_'s review against another edition

dark informative reflective medium-paced

4.25

At times kinda felt like one big ad for the authors podcast but I still found it interesting. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Child abuse, Sexual violence, Transphobia, Slavery, and Xenophobia

dreadspawn's review

dark informative medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Medical content, Medical trauma, Death, Animal cruelty, Slavery, Mental illness, and Forced institutionalization

chelseacrystal's review

informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.75

Gut wrenching but very interesting. I honestly procrastinated finishing this one bc I was having such a good time. 

It’s incredibly well researched and the tone is appropriate given the subject matter without being overly serious. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Torture, Antisemitism, Slavery, Mental illness, Medical trauma, Medical content, Colonisation, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Forced institutionalization, and Body horror

churrocaitie's review

adventurous dark informative medium-paced

5.0

What an amazing book. I love “niche” history and this book takes the cake. And Sam Kean’s writing is perfect for me. I enjoyed how he structured the book in each chapter, and told the stories so well of these “mad scientists”. I almost wish he had this book longer, I kept wanting to learn more. What a perfect book for someone like me who enjoys weird, dark history. And, of course, makes you really think about humanity.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Drug use, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, and Violence

Moderate: Child abuse, War, Genocide, Animal cruelty, Sexual content, Slavery, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Torture, Transphobia, Animal death, Murder, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Gore, and Racism

Minor: Trafficking

boop123's review

dark informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Rape, Medical trauma, Murder, Animal cruelty, Slavery, Violence, Suicide, Sexual assault, Death, Body horror, Racism, and Gore

Moderate: Pedophilia, Transphobia, War, and Antisemitism

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic, Adult/minor relationship, and Miscarriage

alyssatuininga's review

dark emotional funny informative reflective sad fast-paced

4.5

 Fascinating book documenting the dark side of science. This book looks at things like Nazi doctors, grave robbing anatomists, the Tuskeegee experiment, etc.  I knew many of the stories in the book already but many of the questions that this book raised were super interesting and really made me think about these issues. I really enjoy Sam Kean’s writing (although I enjoyed The Violinst’s Thumb more). There was definitely some difficult subject matter in this book but it was well worth a read (although I will admit I skipped the animal torture chapter). 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Slavery, Murder, Torture, Animal cruelty, Injury/Injury detail, and Medical trauma

gk1412's review

challenging dark informative mysterious reflective fast-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Domestic abuse, Pedophilia, Antisemitism, Death, Racism, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Torture, Blood, Body shaming, Child abuse, Deportation, Hate crime, Transphobia, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, Slavery, Ableism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Classism, Forced institutionalization, Homophobia, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Violence

shelbycundiff's review

dark informative reflective sad fast-paced

4.25

A fascinating yet disturbing read. I enjoyed it a lot but some chapters were so graphic it nearly made me gag. Overall great page turnability for non fiction!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror and Medical trauma

Moderate: Suicide, Slavery, and Medical content

mfrisk's review

challenging dark informative slow-paced

3.0

I’ve been reading a lot more this year and getting through books quicker especially those I’ve enjoyed. However, this read took me several months to finish. 

I note this because while I find the overall subject interesting and also important in terms of the fields of science, medicine, and fields which intersect with these areas I don’t feel like these stories were given the appropriate weight and critical lens. As many reviewers mention inappropriate terminology is used for a variety of marginalized populations within this book and I often felt the author was trying to get a laugh out of us (the readers) more than they were working to connect the story to their larger point of morality and ethics. The podcast plugs were annoying but not as egregious as the lack of depth certain stories were given when they covered very sensitive topics. It may not have hurt for their to be additional commentary from other folks especially in stories where marginalized populations were involved and that was only touched on a surface level. I’ve listened to the podcast as well after reading some stories in this book and it has similar issues seen in this book. 

Also want to add this book could have used a more central defining element or at least narrowing down to specific field or some other way to make this more focused. It often was confusing that the stories felt so disconnected and the conclusion doesn’t quite pull together the ideas enough. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Slavery, Self harm, Misogyny, Sexual content, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Forced institutionalization, Colonisation, Torture, Suicide, Sexual harassment, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Sexual assault, Murder, Racism, and Sexism

kyliebloch's review against another edition

challenging dark informative reflective medium-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Animal death, Animal cruelty, and Slavery