UNTHINKABLE: AN EXTRAORDINARY JOURNEY THROUGH the WORLD'S STRANGEST BRAINS (audiobook) by Helen Thomson



Published in 2018 by HarperAudio.
Read by the author, Helen Thomson.
Duration: 7 hours, 19 minutes.
Unabridged.

The author and narrator, Helen Thomson
Helen Thomson is a science writer with a background in neurology. She was inspired by the story of the Jumping Frenchmen of Maine to set out to meet and interview ten people who literally experience the world differently than the rest of us.

Thomson does a solid job of explaining possible scientific explanations for each of these people's conditions and how those conditions may simply be extreme versions of a phenomenon that we all experience.

As in all collections (in this case, a collection of people), some are more interesting than others. For example, I found the story of the man who believed he was dead to be interesting but the story of the man who believed that he was a were-tiger was pretty lame all of the way around.

She also looks at a person who doesn't forget anything, a woman who gets lost everywhere, including in her own home and a man who had a radical personality shift after a head injury. The collection, on the whole, is worth exploring.

The audiobook was read by the author. She is a solid reader, but I would have chosen a professional reader instead.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: UNTHINKABLE: AN EXTRAORDINARY JOURNEY THROUGH the WORLD'S STRANGEST BRAINS.

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