It's a cliche, and one generally applied to singers, not writers, but Mary Roach could write about the phone book and I'd be the first to buy that book.

I've read every one of her books, and she is the most cheerful, observant, funny, clear writers I've ever had the pleasure of reading. She has a keen eye and the good sense to write about whatever she sees that's fascinating, even if it isn't the subject matter of the book - if you're going to talk about bloody and gruesome medical procedures, why not note that the conversation took place in a restaurant and include a waiter determined to do their job in the midst of the carnage conversation?

She clearly loves people, and loves the giddy enthusiasm of scientists who might spend a career mining the loneliest vein in their field. She never admits to knowing more than she does (even though I suspect she knows more than she's letting on). And I've never read a science writer who is as effective at taking the most complex concepts and making them understandable. She's a wonderful, clear-eyed, goofy tour guide through the weirdest corners of science.

In short, Mary Roach is a delight, and this latest book on the past and future of body part replacement/rehabilitation, takes full advantage of her talents.

Many thanks to W.W. Norton & Company and NetGalley for the advance review copy.

Go on another jocular journey with Mary Roach. This time through body parts—specifically, those that you might want to or need to replace. With a few pit stops to take a gander at the parts that are irreplaceable…for now.

The human body is an incredibly complex machine, and efforts to emulate it enough to replace parts of it are at the very least difficult, if not impossible. This is classic Mary Roach with a bit more complicated science.

This book is classic Mary Roach, with all her trademark curiosity, self-deprecating humor, and sometimes questionable choices. Equal parts informative and entertaining, though I did sometimes wish for deeper dives in certain areas. But I understand there is a limit in this format!

I love Mary Roach. I had never considered an interest in prosthetics and transplants, but she takes the reader on a journey both engrossing and wonderful, and all with her trademark humor and charm. There's history and science, curiosity and astonishment all rolled into one volume. Not to mention the fascinating characters she meets along the way. Highly recommend.

The works of Mary Roach are always entertaining forays into popular science with plentiful humors asides, call backs or phrasings. Her latest, Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy explores the myriad body parts and organs that one could have replaced. It's not focused on augmentation and or transhuman futures, but instead on what leads to the need for replacing what we were born with (or with out)? From the common replacement of teeth, treatment of cataracts to the more wild frontiers of genetic manipulation of pigs to grow human organs and organic 3d printing.

Each of the 17 chapters blends research with first person experiences drawn from either interviews or site visits. Roach is highly inquisitive and willing to do quite a lot for the good of the book, though not to extremes of other books, such as Bonk. Though Roach does attempt a night in an iron lung. Each chapter is organized by theme moving around the body by tangent, instead of head to toe.

Throughout each chapter we learn about modern methods of health care or surgery and major milestones in their development. We also learn about the disparity of access and riskiness of some treatments.

You'll learn a lot, especially how important scientific funding is to much of our knowledge.

Recommended to readers of popular science, humor laced non fiction or those curious of the internal world.

Another thoroughly enjoyable pop science book from Mary Roach, this one about prosthetics, organ transplants, and other replacement body parts. Roach's zeal for her subject matter comes through clearly, and I really enjoyed how she tied each chapter and subject to the next one. Roach shares both historical trends and cutting edge research with her usual informative, approachable writing. Thank you to NetGalley and W. W. Norton & Company for a digital review copy.

I've been hopelessly hooked on Mary Roach's writing ever since I picked up Stiff a few years ago, the result of chasing a reference from an interesting passage in some other book I've long forgotten. I've since torn through the rest of her books and can say that Replaceable You stands up to the best of them! With its fascinating coverage of current medical research and Mary's hilarious commentary, it's a real delight.

Mary really shines when she's reporting on somewhat socially taboo topics, and it's hard not to appreciate her candor and willingness to ask some really bizarre questions to Real Live Scientists™. She's the sort of friend you'd want to bring along to a bunch of museum tours and talks just to see what she comes up with, because you know you'll always learn something new and have a great time while you're at it.

This book is practically impossible to read it without stopping every few minutes to share interesting tidbits with whoever's accessible at the moment. In particular, if you liked the bits about penis reconstruction in Grunt or the look at what happens to cadavers in Stiff, there's a lot more to love in here. (Alternatively, if you've read this and haven't read the others, you know where to go from here!)

Overall, Replaceable You is a wonderful celebration of the complexity of the human body, and the tenacity of the human spirit in trying to recreate its parts and functions. I've already recommended it to a few friends, and am now just waiting for a book tour...

(P.S. It was kind of fun to go back and check what blade they used for my intubation during anesthesia last year. It's (Mac 3) a favorite of one of the fellows mentioned in training! Many thanks to the surgical team for not chipping my teeth, though they did scrape my lip up a bit.)

* Thanks to NetGalley and W. W. Norton & Company for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. *

Mary Roach does it again! She turns the weirdest corners of science into absolute delight. Replaceable You is a witty & fascinating deep dive into the bizarre history (& future) of replacing body parts. From brass noses to pig hearts to stem-cell-grown hair, she makes even the strangest facts feel human, hilarious, & unforgettable.

I’ve read about half of her books and plan to read them all. Each one is a reminder that science is stranger & funnier than fiction.

If you're at all familiar with Roach's prior work, you'll know exactly what to expect here, but this time she is tackling all things transplantation. Roach balances readability with accurate science (as far as I'm aware) and a generous sprinkle of her wry wit. I didn't know a lot about transplants (especially transplants not of the organ variety), and I definitely learned a lot reading this book. Roach is obviously a highly curious individual and that certainly comes out in her books- you truly never know what's coming next, jumping from talking about skin grafts to penile and vaginal reconstructions and beyond. Roach is the queen of pop science, and this book is definitely no exception.

Mary Roach has an uncanny knack for explaining medical information in laymen's terms, making her books exceptionally readable and Replaceable You is no exception. The premise of this book is how scientists are replacing parts of the human body (think nose jobs, hair implants, and stem cell therapies) and the struggles and advancements that have been made. Like her other titles, Roach manages to find practitioners on the cutting edge of these technologies and gets them to talk about their work, warts and all, while still keeping an optimist's eye on the outcomes. All in all an excellent read.

Thank you W. W. Norton & Company for this arc.

After finishing “Replaceable You” I can see why it takes her about 3-4 years between new books. There is a lot packed into this one and the research into the research featured in the book is amazing. She is very clear that what is in the book is mostly a primer for the armchair reader experience rather than a deep dive into these subjects and her interest is “drawn to the human elements of the quest.”

The initial focus of the ‘replacements’ is on life or death things – new hearts, kidneys, and other organs needed for transplantation or skin grafts for burn victims and ways to minimize or eliminate our body’s negative immune response to them. But also covered are some surgeries for transgender patients, prostheses, hair replacement, joint replacements, cataract surgeries in Mongolia, cosmetic surgeries, ostomies, and new and ingenious ways people are trying to ‘print’ organs, extend the life of donated organs, and the process of tissue donation.

Things are being done now that couldn’t be dreamed of even 40 years ago. Things are being dreamed of now that might take another 20-30 years before we might see the clinical trials but when this stuff arrives – and I have no doubt that it will – lives will be saved and changed. While our ethics are much better than they used to be, some will have qualms about how animals are still being used.

Mary Roach comes up with fascinating ideas for books and then manages to get insiders to agree to talk to her, answer her questions, let her into their labs and OR rooms and observe close up. She asks questions I wouldn’t think of, dares to try things I’d think twice about, and even gets previous interviewees to agree to submit themselves to her investigations again. Bless the patients who were willing to also give her the inside scoop on skin grafts, ostomies, and the infinite variety of prosthesis now available.

Let me just add a warning as Roach doesn’t hesitate to take us where some readers might not wish to go. She probes her subjects to learn about their specialties and then tries to turn her notes into descriptions that she and we can understand a bit better. This is a fun ride through the attempts to replicate the amazing things that our bodies do naturally and which we can only, in some cases, still just marvel at. B

In REPLACEABLE YOU, author Mary Roach tackles the past and current science behind replacing worn out or missing body parts as well as body augmentation, and keeping an eye on the future and what we can expect in the years to come. Roach travels within the United States and abroad to look into several topics such as pig farms where replacement organs are grown for human transplantation, cosmetic surgery clinics specializing in fat redistribution (for bigger butts), companies at the forefront of prosthetic limb innovation, and hair regrowth and transplantation, among many others.

If you’ve read Mary Roach before, you’re well aware of what you’re getting into. Mary is endlessly curious and approaches these subjects with a genuine desire to not only understand how these processes work, but to present it to her audience in an easily digestible and oftentimes hilarious way. This isn’t my first rodeo with Roach, but I can easily say that this was the funniest of her work to date. I laughed out loud at her asides and footnotes and the way that she is more than willing to use self-deprecating humour. The bit about the early days of blood donation or the chapter studying the creative ways in which men had a certain body part replaced or.. rebuilt.

To be honest, this can be a fairly grim subject, especially when looking into something like organ donation following death, but I feel like Mary’s approach is one that can get even the most squeamish reader on board. This is an easy recommendation and I would not be surprised to see it land on my year-end list.

A typical Mary Roach book -- highly informative, carefully researched, slyly funny, and fascinating to read. If you read Bill Bryson's The Body, this is similar, but focused on transplants and regenerative medicine. It's readable without a medical background, but has interesting details and stories for even those in healthcare to enjoy reading this. Highly recommend!

"Replaceable You" by Mary Roach is science writing with a mischievous grin. This book dives headfirst (and sometimes with prosthetic limbs) into humanity’s never-ending quest to patch, upgrade, and outright swap out our squishiest parts.

I've read all of Roach's books. Roach, as always, brings her snort-laugh wit to the party, dragging us through a parade of oddballs, surgeons, biohackers, and the occasional harvested cadaver limb.

You’ll read about everything from organs grown in stem cell “hair nurseries” to attempts at 3D printing spare parts.
Spoiler: not a single scene is boring.

But fair warning: this book spends nearly half its time on the past.
Just as you’re itching for a jetpack kidney or a downloadable heart, Roach detours into the wacky history of medicine—think iron lungs big enough for a disco (but only if you like the rhythm of labored breathing), and the lost art of crafting noses from brass, because nothing says “fashion” like a faceful of steampunk.

It’s charming… but if you came craving future-shock, you may find yourself staring at the calendar, wishing she’d hurry up and get to the bionic arms, brain chips, or at least a Bluetooth spleen.

And don’t expect a grand promise that nature is almost obsolete.

On the contrary, Roach’s conclusion drops the mike with a tear.
Not a metaphorical tear—an actual, salty, rolling-down-your-cheek tear.
Turns out, scientists can engineer robotic pancreases and print some new tracheas, but when it comes to replicating the humble human tear (yes, your basic public-crying fluid), they’re still stumped.
Apparently, its precise chemistry is tougher to copy than most nanotechnology.
So if we can’t even duplicate a tear, what hope do we have for building a better lung, heart, or anything else that squishes and squelches?

Still, call me an optimist, but I think we'll get there this century.

In conclusion, come for the face transplants, stay for the punchlines, and don’t blame Roach if you find yourself crying (with genuine, irreplicable tears) over the sheer weirdness—and stubborn brilliance—of the human body.

VERDICT: 4.5 stars out of 5.

Mary Roach is an auto read author for me. Her research and discovery is so interesting and down to earth that allows easy understanding for the reader. In Replaceable You she looks at all the ways that we "replace" things in and on the body. We're talking organ donations, xenotransplantation, tissue donation, hair transplants, prosthetics, cataract surgery etc. There was enough shared with each subject that gives you a deep dive, but never to a burdensome level.

Read this to learn weird and cool things about our bodies and replacing parts of them.

Thank you to NetGalley and W. W. Norton & Company for the gifted e-arc.

Mary Roach is irreplaceable. She makes the fascinating even more so while bringing it all into perspective for we simple folk. Replaceable You explores topics I never would have a imagined but thoroughly enjoyed - Is that a finger in your pants, or are you just happy to see me? Read this book, laugh along and learn to appreciate all the benefits of having an intact human body.

Yet again Mary Roach continues to deliver on everything I want in a nonfiction book. Her sense of humor, her research, her interviews, all of it comes together in such an enjoyable way that I always find myself wanting physical copies of her books to lend out to friends/family just to get others obsessed with her work. This book is such an interesting topic and I really loved the history we get alongside the modern medicine and hopes for the future, Mary delivers it all to us with her iconic voice and I just cant stop reading!

I cant wait to see what Mary Roach writes next!

This is the second book by Mary Roach that I’ve read, the first being “Gulp” (which, as I said in my review, wasn’t the best book to read after eating lunch—but still an interesting read).

Mary is an engaging author and takes the time to understand and know her subject. Her dedication to her topic was evident in this book as she takes the reader to various places in the world to see the future of replacement parts of the human body, such as China to see where pigs are bred for possible human transplantation, and to Boston, Massachusetts to talk to the scientists who are working on replacement skin for burn patients.

The human body is an amazing machine and duplicating parts for replacement hasn’t been easy. Despite amazing advances, scientists haven’t totally been successful in this endeavor though what they have been able to do is notable.

Consider how the iron lung was able to keep patients alive during the polio epidemic, when their own respiratory muscles were unable to keep them alive, or how artificial joints are allowing people to walk, run, or even compete in the Paralympics.

I appreciated the fact that that author Mary Roach didn’t just talk to the scientists on the cutting edge of replacement parts, but she also spoke to those patients who currently have a replacement, such as an artificial foot or leg, or someone who has had to have his or her colon or bladder removed and now has a stoma to allow waste products to be stored and eliminated.

While Mary focus was the future of replacement parts, another book I read and previously reviewed, which would make a nice companion to “Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy” looked at the history of replacement (transplant) surgery: “Spare Parts: The Story of Medicine Through the History of Transplant Surgery” by Paul Craddock.

This is an easy book to read, not overly technical, but technical enough when it needs to be. I enjoy author Mary Roach’s approach to writing, making it approachable to casual readers but of interest to those who have a bit more of a medical background.

4/5 stars

[Thank you to NetGalley and the author for the advanced ebook copy in exchange for my honest and objective opinion, which I have given here.]

Mary Roach makes science writing so accessible, and I found this account of all the different ways body parts can be replaced, altered, "improved", etc. to be really interesting. The signature humor and informative and entertaining footnotes are present in this, making it easily digestible.