Unknown Melancholies

me @ every nonfiction book I see

Not going to lie, I was at first scared to approach The Emperor of All Maladies with so much as a ten-foot stick. The book has been sitting on my desk for two weeks now, but for whatever reason, it's size has yet to stop shocking me. 571 pages may not seem terrible, especially when you take into account that 91 of those pages are composed of the index, glossary, and notes, but it's still a pretty hefty book. It wouldn't be all that much of a problem except for the fact that I don't like nonfiction. Like at all.

Now before you start coming at me with your pitchforks, sure, there are great nonfiction books out there, some of which I have read. But as a whole, I find it difficult to enjoy reading the genre, especially compared to fiction. Usually when I read a nonfiction book I might as well be sucking the life force out of my body with a vacuum. In fact, I make a point to avoid making so much as eye contact with nonfiction books, and I really only read them when forced to. (APELC here I come!)

I'm looking at you, nonfiction

So it was a huge relief when I didn't feel like I'd shaved ten years off my life when I started reading The Emperor of All Maladies. (Shout out to my science nerd grandfather for convincing me to give it a try!) Right off the bat I was blown away by the prose. It may not be the best I've ever read (and certainly not Gabriel Garcia Marquez-level), but even in just the first couple of pages, it far exceeded my expectations with lines like, "Medical school, internship, and residency had been physically and emotionally grueling, but the first months of the fellowship flicked away all those memories as if all of that had been child's play, the kindergarten of medical training" (4). And “In the parking lot of the hospital, a chilly, concrete box lit by neon floodlights, I spent the end of every evening after rounds in stunned incoherence, the car radio crackling vacantly in the background, as I compulsively tried to reconstruct the events of the day” (5). I've always thought of nonfiction as being this very straight-forward, technical kind of writing, so it's jarring--in a good way--reading this book.

And don't get me started on Mukherjee's metaphors, because they're pure gold. Mukherjee takes what could easily be stiff and sterile and breathes life into it. My favorite metaphors thus far is “The disease had turned into an object of empty fascination--a wax-museum doll--studied and photographed in exquisite detail but without any therapeutic or practical advances” (12). Though a close second is “The bone marrow becomes a dysfunctional mill, a malnourished biological factory oddly reminiscent of the cloth factories of Bombay” (29). This book is very information- and fact-heavy, but Mukherjee manages to makes it easily understood and conceptualized. Not only that, but he makes all of the history and science truly interesting for more than just the history buffs and science nerds.