Rating: 
Summary: One of his best books!
Review: I've read several books by this author, including "The man who mistook his wife for a hat", "The island of the color blind" and "Seeing voices", but I have to say that this is the one I've enjoyed the most. In keeping with the format of his hugely popular "The man who mistook his wife for a hat", Oliver Sacks presents his readers with several case stories that are both gripping and enlightening. As always, the author's greatest talent is being able to teach the general reader about the intricacies of the human mind, without reducing the particular patient to something other than human. The people behind each of these case studies are never reduced to being just freaks of nature, but are instead described with a great deal of respect. I highly recommend all of Dr Sacks' books, but this is the best one to start with if you're new to his work. However, if lengthy footnotes are a pet peeve of yours, you may want to stay away. I, on the other hand, along with many other of his readers, really enjoy the many footnotes as they give his books more depth and points the reader in new interesting directions.
Rating:
Summary: ILLUMINATING, FASCINATING
Review: I've read some of his prior works and always leave with the same sense of awe he admonishes. Thats his gift - he can talk to us. So what if hes kind of dumb (which he is); Sacks frames knowledge in an easy grasp. In AN ANTHROPOLOGIST ON MARS, Dr. Sacks performs magic on pages 24-26. I bet he doesn't even know it. You don't have to buy it. Just go to the store/library and read pages 24-26. COLOUR MY WORLD!
Rating: 
Summary: Seven fascinating neurological clinical case studies
Review: I, too, found this to be a wonderful, stimulating reading experience. This book receives an 8 instead of a 10 because some of the discussions about the physics of color vision in the first chapter would have been easier to understand with illustrations. As is, it's hard to follow at times. Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed the book.
Rating:
Summary: A great way to learn about neurological disorders
Review: If you ever wanted to learn more about unusual neurological disorders, but were afraid get to be buried in dry research papers and journals, here is a book for you. From a distance, this is just a collection of detailed case histories about different neurological disorders. Up close, it is high-quality biographical prose that gives the reader an real feel for what it might be like to have each of the disorders. We're not talking about symptom lists and treatment regimens, but everyday life for a person with autism (or one of the other disorders covered). A few chapters get a dry in places, but the book overall is a work of art. The only reason I gave it four stars instead of five is that it is not quite as good as Sacks's other great work, "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat". I wish that four-and-a-half stars had been a choice, or even 4.7 or "almost-5". I am a practicing clinical psychologist and, when I begin working with a client newly diagnosed with a disorder covered in one Sacks's books, I usually ask them to read the relevant chapters. They almost always come back to me and say, "Yeah, that's it exactly!"
Rating:
Summary: There is some of us in everything he describes...
Review: Just to describe the unusual would be freakish; what is haunting about all of Sack's writing is that all of the people
he describes -- no matter how bizare or tragic -- have a lot in common with us. These essays will make you think
about everyday actions -- simple things like reading these
words -- in a new way. These essays will also introduce
you to amazing people you will not forget.
Rating:
Summary: This is the mind
Review: Many of us feel removed from the world of medicine. Doctors seem to speak a language beyond our comprehension. Oliver Sacks takes us into his world where we feel immediately at home. He writes of real people and gives us a fascinating, if disturbing, insight into the paradoxes of the human mind. For me the most moving story is 'The Last Hippy'. Greg lost his immediate memory following a massive cerebral tumour. However many times you see him it is always a meeting of strangers. They go to a Grateful Dead concert. Greg is once again a fan. He shouts cheers and sings. Next day the whole experience has gone. We also read of the Tourette's syndrome sufferer whose tics disappear whenever he begins work - as a surgeon. There is the artist who sees only black and white, the autistic/artistic genius. This is a gem of a book which deserves to be read over and over. You will learn something new every time.
Rating:
Summary: An unusual and compelling form of travel literature
Review: Oliver Sacks has a rare gift for sharing his professional interest with readers/listeners and entertaining us as we learn. As the title "An Anthropologist on Mars" implies, his world is filled with oddities of human nature, made to appear more human than odd by Sacks sensitive storytelling. I first visited the world of Oliver Sacks in 1987 when "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" arrived at the local library. His ability to simplify challenging patient histories made clinical neurology fascinating. With this new volume he returns to familiar territory. The added bonus of listening to Sacks read his own work is quite intimate. Particularly when he shares the story of Temple Grandin, an autistic professor unable to tolerate human touch but instinctively comforting animals, and sharing her ability with the meat industry, a group not traditionally thought of as sensitive. While listening to these "Paradoxical Tales", Oliver Sacks transports his audience to a world both unfamiliar and captivating. A place we may not wish to live, but hard to resist visiting.
Rating:
Summary: An unusual and compelling form of travel literature
Review: Oliver Sacks has a rare gift for sharing his professional interest with readers/listeners and entertaining us as we learn. As the title "An Anthropologist on Mars" implies, his world is filled with oddities of human nature, made to appear more human than odd by Sacks sensitive storytelling. I first visited the world of Oliver Sacks in 1987 when "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" arrived at the local library. His ability to simplify challenging patient histories made clinical neurology fascinating. With this new volume he returns to familiar territory. The added bonus of listening to Sacks read his own work is quite intimate. Particularly when he shares the story of Temple Grandin, an autistic professor unable to tolerate human touch but instinctively comforting animals, and sharing her ability with the meat industry, a group not traditionally thought of as sensitive. While listening to these "Paradoxical Tales", Oliver Sacks transports his audience to a world both unfamiliar and captivating. A place we may not wish to live, but hard to resist visiting.
Rating:
Summary: Thorough And Compassionate!
Review: Oliver Sacks has always had a knack for deftly explaining the sometimes confusing world of neurology, but "Anthropologist" is a remarkable series of case studies. Dr. Sacks weaves the tales of seven human beings, each having a different neurological "difference" and portraying them in a matter of fact, logical light. Instead of viewing each person as having a disability, Dr. Sacks focuses on the remarkable way they have learned to adapt and make the best out of all situations. What to make of a painter that is colorblind? How can a person with Tourette Syndrome possibly be a surgeon? Why does an autistic teenager seem unable to verbally communicate appropriately, yet shows signs of immense, almost sacred "feelings" in his drawings? All these questions are anwered and mostly with more questions. However, this book differs than most in that it manages to bring a "soulful spirit" to those of which Dr. Sacks writes. A spirit that eludes most human beings.
Rating:
Summary: A sympathetic, almost poetic ,writer
Review: Oliver Sacks has the uncanny ability to take the reader into the minds and lives of his patients, and make them real. I've always found the autistic Temple Grandin particularly fascinating. Unable to understand human beings (hence the title, _An Anthropologist on Mars,_) she found she could connect with, and understand, animals. The other stories are equally interesting. An artist loses his color vision. At first he is terribly distaught. Then later he finds he enjoys it. For one, he begins to live at night, with a totally new life. He also finds (as others in his situation have discovered) that his eyesight is radically sharper--he can read a license plate a block away. Another of his patients suffers from Tourette's Syndrome. In his case one advantage is his reflexes become abnormally fast--he can dash in and out of revolving doors (and when he goes on medication he ends up slowed down, which results in some painful collusions.) An intriguing book that everyone should enjoy.
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