Really interesting - if sometimes a little superficial - collection of case studies that the author has come across in his career as a neurologist. This is pop science, so I don't expect (and probably wouldn't understand anyway) the genuine depths of each case, but they're still fascinating to read about even if they do leave you wanting more of an explanation, or more of a context. I don't know... I might have rated this higher if it were more in-depth studies of just three or four cases instead of skipping through two dozen of them, but then again such a book might have lost the wonder factor of all these strange things crammed together.

It could very easily, I think, read as some sort of neurological freak show, as these patients and their extraordinary conditions are displayed for reader entertainment. But Sacks appears so genuinely compassionate as he recalls his interactions with these people, so kind and professional, that there's no hint of exploitation here. It reads very much as an attempt to educate, and to raise awareness of the possible disordered workings of the brain, and as such it really is compelling and leaves me wanting to know more.