It's amazing what the human race has done in the name of science. Remember when doctors gave crying kids morphine? Or how we found out about mercury poisoning? <i>Quackey </i> by Lydia Kang has it all. The novel mixes dark humor with hard science. It's an exploration of of history's craziest cures, experiments, and scams.

This book was quirky (sometimes a bit cheesy), but a little hard to get through. While the storytelling was compelling, it wasn't engaging enough to keep me on my seat. I think most of it was that I'm the wrong audience. While I appreciated the humor between gore, it was a little too forced. Also, the book was not something I would read again after learning the important tidbits. And don't get me wrong, the tidbits were interesting. The whole time I was praising the Lord I was born in a time when doctors understand how certain procedures can be harmful. Then again, who knows what present day medicine practices will be considered future quackery.

People that have a love for medicine, history, science, or random facts would love this book. It just wasn't my cup of tea.

This is a great read! I was impressed with the balance of humor and research that went into Quakery. If you like odd histories of the psuedoscience behind some of the strangest things thought at one time, and currently, to heal various ailments, pick up this book!

Quackery, written by a medical doctor and a librarian/historian/journalist, chronicles the history of medicine’s missteps. Medicine wasn’t always the hygienic, sterilized process we have today, and the road was paved by both well-meaning doctors and quacks who capitalized on misinformation.

Medicine has existed in some from since the Neatherthals, but prevailing theories changed hundreds of times. From bloodletting to burning, enemas to lobotomies, the authors detail the procedures, the doctors, and the reasons behind truly horrifying – yet widely accepted and trusted – practices. Additionally, Quackery details many of the fake cures that sprang up around these theories, some of which were simply get-rich-quick schemes and others the product of delusional minds. The text itself is wickedly humorous and extremely readable. It’s divided into into chapters covering major cure ingredients or practices such as Strychnine, Electricity, Animal Magnetism, etc. Within these chapters are subheadings, and the text is broken up with photographs, illustrations, and vintage advertisements.

This was an extremely fun and quirky book to read. I couldn’t help thinking, as I read about Radionics and Universal Magnetic Fluid, that people were extremely gullible in the past. It’s easy to judge our ancestors, looking at these tales from an era where we have so much knowledge at our fingertips. But then again, can we really criticize people who believed they could cure lameness with an electrified hairbrush when millions fall for alternative therapies every day (check Quackwatch.org for some recent examples)? Is our purchase of weight loss pills and adherence to fad diets so different from those who ate freeze dried tapeworms or checked themselves into Linda Hazzard’s Institute of Natural Theraputics and paid to be starved to death? It seems the more things change, the more they stay the same at least in our willingness to believe in a quick cure for our health woes.

I received an Advance Reader Copy of this book from the publisher, but the thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.

This is an interesting book. Looking back on a lot of things that we used to do is so amazing. It makes me glad that modern science has vastly improved & we are wiser than we once were.

Tried to download this on a number of devices and had no luck - therefore couldn't review

The problem I had with this book is that it deals with both health scams and the errors of the legitimate medical establishment and treats them same way. This was a major problem in the first two sections of the book. The later sections of the book improve. The later parts of the book describes the history of certain treatments(i.e. hypnosis, anesthesia). The book becomes kinder towards the incomplete knowledge of medicine at the time(i.e. the good side of using leaches). It also has stories of pure medical fraud such as knowingly worthless medical devices that were sold.

However, the book begins by criticizing some establishment medical practices of the time. The book starts off with the example of Dr. Benjamin Rush who in late eighteenth century was considered a reputable physician. The book states in a tongue and cheek sort of way that this physician believed in the use of mercury and blood letting which was an accepted practice at the time. However, Dr. Rush also did some good things in medicine; he advocated for the humane treatment of psychiatric patients and advocated for improvements in the Philadelphia water and sanitation which helped end an epidemic. I felt doctors like Dr. Rush deserved better treatment than the book provides. These doctors weren’t “quacks” . They did the best they could do with the limited and often incorrect medical knowledge of the time.

Furthermore, probably at the time of Dr. Rush there was much deception in the practice of medicine. There were no “truth in advertising” laws” or legal standards about who could call themselves a doctor. There were probably many totally fake doctors practicing and probably knowingly false medications sold.

After the first two sections, the book improves. It contains some information about the history of some medical treatments. It becomes more respectful towards legitimate doctors and the limitations of medicine at the time. The book chronicles how certain treatments evolved.

In addition, the book gives examples of medical fraud. The books describes some worthless medical devices as the Dynamizer. I learned how term it is like”snake oil”(meaning fake) got started.

Thus, the second part of the book had some interesting anecdotes about the history of medicine which many readers may find interesting.

However, to get to the second part, I had to overcome my indignation that wrong but legitimate medical practices were being lumped together with practices, even at the time were being used, were considered fraudulent. The book would have been much better if it dealt either with fraudulent medical practices or errors of the medical establishment rather than combining these two aspects of medicine together under the category of bad medicine.

Before the review, an important note on my rating system. Two stars from me does not mean that the book was bad. It means, that the book is actually good, it's just something that I can't see myself reading again just because of my personal preferences.

This book was highly entertaining and gory at the same time. As I was reading it, I kept thinking how glad I was to be alive during a time when we know procedures used in the past are actually harmful. I wonder how many of the things we done in health care now will be considered quackery in a few hundred years. On the bright side, at least I've never had to deal with the procedures mentioned in this book.

I enjoyed the book, pulling faces all the way through, but I think for me personally, it's not something I would read again. Now that I have learned the information, I'm good. People that are into medicine, history, or science in general would like this book. I really think anyone would like this book, but it takes someone with a strong interest in this kind of information to decided to read it over and over.

There are some cheesy jokes throughout that broke up some of the gross bits. There are also little thoughts throughout that echoed what I was thinking while reading those sections. The author knows that some of the procedures done in olden days is really off the wall, and the notes make me feel like I'm not alone in my thought process.

The pictures were a huge help in really understanding what the processes were. When you read that they used a certain instrument that is not used today, it's hard to picture how everything worked. The images clarified those questions.

I received a copy of this book through NetGalley for an honest review.
Author: Lydia Kang
Publisher: Workman Publishing Company
Publication Date: 17 Oct 2017

Intriguing and Thought Provoking. 5 Stars!

I am fascinated by the history of medicine. I've never quite found a book that struck a balance between relating to the reader as a lay person but also entrusting they had the intelligence to grasp the material. Not only did Ms. Kang and Mr. Pedersen achieve this, they did so with humor and detail.

I also truly appreciated the historical context and antidotes to each treatment/element covered. This combined with the photography, graphic design and layout of the the book made for a fascinating and informative read.

Ms. Kang and Mr. Pedersen know their audience. I often felt as if they knew as readers we would be interested in what most would consider minute or obscure details. These details, its context and historical examples of peddlers, doctors and patients make this a thorough romp through medical science mishaps and misconceptions. These elements combined give magic to the book.

While I read it straight through, I could easily see this beautifully designed book adorning a prominent place on a book shelf or coffee table for one to peruse a topic of interest. I only wish I could get my hands on a hard copy now!

I received an advanced reader copy (ARC) from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

This is absolutely one of the most interesting nonfictional books I’ve ever read.

5/5 –Wholeheartedly recommend this to anyone and everyone with a remote interest in medicine and drugs.

I loved how easy it was to read. I’ve taken plenty of science classes, especially dealing with medicine and healthcare, but this book is truly easy to follow for anyone regardless science background. There are interesting pictures, clever puns, and gruesome descriptions!

This is totally something I would buy to leave on my coffee table for visitors to peruse.

I love books like these, highly readable fun, scary and informative all at the same time. Quackery explores the "cures" people turned to in times past and not so past. Radium, gold, arsenic, opium all were used in some way in the past as cures for all sorts of ailments as varied as gout, syphilis, cough, cold, toothache, cancer. People in pursuit of good health, and long life have put their lives and money into the hands of well meaning doctors working to treat their patients with the best tools and information they had at the time, various types of medicine men/women, as well as charlatans and various and sundry others looking to make a quick buck off the desperate and ailing. The lure of Quackery is still not lost on us in the modern age, people still fall for all sorts of claims from radio personalities to television doctors to celebrities. The desire for a magic pill to cure all ills is strong.

(This was an ARC downloaded from netgalley.com and the formatting, photo captions, and inset stories still needed work.)

3.5 stars. This collection of ineffective, odd, dangerous, and downright INSANE medical "treatments" was interesting and somewhat humorous. I knew about some of these ideas but this book covers such a vast array of quackery that I learned about a number of new "cures" that I'd never heard of before.

I wasn't entirely in love with the ultra-chatty writing style; there were some pop-culture references that might not endure the test of time. But it was pretty amusing, overall.

An amusing collection of - just what the title says - Worst Ways to Cure. This book was a very humorous look at some of the extreme measures that people have put themselves through all in the name of being healthy. It reminded me that medicine is a practice - and I really hope someday practice makes perfect. In the meantime I am grateful for how far we have come. The author sprinkles in some interesting side facts that add to the readability of the book. The book is not for the faint of heart has some of the explanations of treatments and side effects can be graphic. The illustrations and graphics really enhance the reading experience.
This is a great book for those of us who read more than one at a time as you can pick it up and put it down without losing the story line.

Thank you NetGalley for the chance to read this book in exchange for an honest opinion.
Quackery tells the story of past efforts to heal and how some of these attempts killed instead of healing. Told in a semi humorous way, it is easy to read and yet horrifying at times when we realize we have had some of these treatments ourselves.
How many of us were treated to a dose of ipecac as children? How many of us would do so now? Were we really being poisoned? How many of us played with mercury when we were young? Watching the rolling balls kept us occupied in science class and when a thermometer broke. Yes, we were told not to touch it, but how many of us listened?
Radiation is a wonder when used correctly, but deadly if not. Just ask Marie Curie- if you could. How lucky are we now to be cured by it, yet we need to be protected from it, too.
These are just a few examples of what Quackery is all about. Humorous yes, but a good reminder of how far we have come and how far yet to go.
The subtitle: A brief history of the worst ways to cure everything says it all. Anyone with an interest in googling how to heal any problem you have would enjoy reading this first. The laughs alone will make you feel better.

Humorous and scary look at quackery

This is not a kind, gentle look at a bygone era. It is a funny (including puns), sarcastic look at quack treatments with the both the benefit of hindsight and what should have been common sense at the time. In certain respects, the book was scary because these treatments were actually used. Authors Lydia Kang and Nate Pedersen also discuss some current applications of these treatments e.g., arsenic and phlebotomy but not in any sort of detail. One story, lobotomy, overlapped with a chapter in Paul Offit’s book, “Pandora’s Lab” and it was interesting to contrast how each book handled this topic; Offit with his careful consideration of the information versus Kang’s and Pedersen’s pie-in-the-face approach. I loved both approaches and if you enjoyed Pandora’s Lab, you should definitely consider reading Quackery.

Really fun and interesting book! I love that there are so many photos integrated with the narrative. There's always so much interest in medical history, and I'm particularly excited to recommend this to fans of the Sawbones podcast.

I have wanted to read more non-fiction all year but I've only read a few so when this one came up on Netgalley, I had to request it and I was accepted. It's all about the weird, odd, sickly and frankly very dangerous 'cures' and 'medicines' that were used throughout human history that actually did a lot more harm than good as well as the quacks that claimed these substances, pills, poisons or techniques would work...spoilers, they don't.

I love the cover and I also love the layout as it contains photographs, images, other little snippets of information and it is set out in bitesized chunks so you can dip in and out which is what I did so it did take me a lot longer to read but I really enjoyed it...well, I found it very interesting and a bit disgusted at times as well as being really confused as to why people used poisons, toxins and really odd substances or methods to try and cure people, it didn't work out - especially the awful 'medicine' used to treat women.One of my favourite line from this book was: "There's no greater turn on for women than emanating gamma rays from their vaginas"...

I loved this book, it was so interesting and quite shocking at times! I did know some of the information and cases mentioned already from college, university and from all of the documentaries I watch but there was quite a lot of information I didn't know. I found the first 60% more interesting than the rest but it's still definitely worth a read and I'll probably buy the physical book!

humanity, snark-fest, nonfiction, medical

I got this book from the publisher via Netgalley shortly after reading another horrific nonfiction book on radium poisoning, so reading this one took longer than it should have. Especially as this one is designed to be a reality check, not inflame the reader to anger.
In this very well researched compendium of the idiocy of mankind through the ages, the varied negative results of attempts to cure man's ills is balanced with bad puns and snarky asides. That is a good thing, in my opinion. From Roman and Egyptian times until now, treatment practices have both remained similar (especially in the snake oil sense) and built upon earlier trials and errors.
There are multiple examples of misguided usage under each heading and subheading.
Did you know that "mad as a hatter" refers to mercury poisoning due to the process of making a hat? What about the well known business of selling radium toothpaste? And then there are all those treatments for "wandering womb".
The various herbals included strychnine and the opiates. The one thing that was a positive in the 1860s was that medical opiate use most likely reduced the mortality from cholera and dysentery. I certainly did not know of the lingering misuse of strychnine in athletics. And here I thought it was only popular in murder mysteries!
Then it moves along to the ever popular use of tools for bloodletting. This practice continued far longer than sense would indicate, being used even for battle wounds! It was also the real cause of death for George Washington, not the pneumonia! Bloodletting using leeches was also used in cases of stroke. Todays medical knowledge and pharmaceuticals use a bio similar product to dissolve clots in occlusive strokes. Another resurrected treatment is the use of (now sterile) maggots to remove dead tissues from wounds.
And how could the practice of Trephining be ignored? The drilling of a hole in the skull to relieve pressure or stop seizures or cure madness has been going on since before the Aztecs. Not a good thing before sterile technique, but archeology has proved that some did live afterwards.
We do continue to be a gullible species, but with the advent of some of the anti psychotic meds, at least we have stopped doing lobotomy. But there has been a resurrection of the use of electroshock therapy in some areas.
There's a lot more in this book, but the authors (and me, too) hope that the readers will learn not only history from this book, but to use more uncommon sense when faced with todays nostrums and panaceas (don't get me started on drug advertising! ).
This book is well worth the money, and the illustrations and references were very interesting (even in PDF format).
Disclaimer. In addition to being a history geek, I have been a registered nurse for more years than I care to admit.

In Quackery, Lydia King provides a hilarious look at some of the most outrageous medical practices throughout history. Teething baby? Mercury cream will calm them right down. Want a pill you can take and still hand down to your kids? Try antimony tablets! IPA too bland for your tastes? Strychnine will provide the bitter buzz you crave! From cocaine tooth drops to lobotomies to irradiated water to tobacco smoke enemas, this book covers an amazing amount of snake oil, some touted by the medical minds of their day and some not.

The book is incredibly entertaining and liberally sprinkled with photos and drawings (some truly nightmare inspiring). This is one of those science books you can read and not even realize how much information you're learning. Want to find out which cutting edge medical treatment contributed to the deaths of Byron, Mozart, and George Washington? Which animal's testicles you should wear around your neck to prevent pregnancy? Or why corn flakes are part of an anti-masturbation diet? Look no further!

Any one who likes a good dose of humor with their nonfiction will enjoy this book. If you like Mary Roach's writing, Unmentionable by Therese Oneill, or any other books in that vein, this book was meant for you.

An advanced copy of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The things people have ingested or rubbed onto themselves is hard to believe. From tobacco and radium toothpaste to mercury cures and leeches to lobotomies, it's hard to believe anyone survived (actually a lot of people didn't). This is a fascinating, well illustrated volume of our freaky medical past. Although if you listen to current pharmaceutical ads where the side effects are worse than the disease, maybe we haven't progressed as far as we think!