On Immunity (Biss) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
On Immunity casts a spell.... There's drama in watching this smart writer feel her way through this material. She's a poet, an essayist and a class spy. She digs honestly into her own psyche and into those of "people like me," and she reveals herself as believer and apostate, moth and flame.
Dwight Garner - New York Times


Subtle, spellbinding.... Sontag said she wrote Illness as Metaphor to "calm the imagination, not to incite it," and On Immunity also seeks to cool and console...[Biss] advances from all sides, like a chess player, drawing on science, myth, literature to herd us to the only logical end, to vaccinate
Parul Sehgal - New York Times Book Review


A welcome antidote--or "inoculation," as the subtitle suggests--against the toxic shouting match occurring between 'anti-vaxxers' and their opponents.... Biss leaps nimbly through a vertiginous range of subjects.... Brilliant and entertaining.
Boston Globe


A philosophical look at the history and practice of vaccination that reads like Joan Didion at her best. If you are yourself a nonfiction author, your initial response to this book might be to decide immediately on another line of work; Biss is that intimidatingly talented.... This is cultural commentary at its highest level, a searching examination of the most profound issues of health, identity and the tensions between individual parenting decisions and society.
Washington Post


By exploring the anxieties about what's lurking inside our flu shots, the air, and ourselves, [Biss] drives home the message that we are all responsible for one another. On Immunity will make you consider that idea on a fairly profound level.
Entertainment Weekly


On Immunity...weaves metaphor and myth, science and sociology, philosophy and politics into a tapestry rich with insight and intelligence.
Jerome Groopman - New York Review of Books


[An] elegant, intelligent and very beautiful book, which occupies a space between research and reflection, investigating our attitudes toward immunity and inoculation through a personal and cultural lens.
Los Angeles Times


Biss's gracious rhetoric and her insistence that she feels "uncomfortable with both sides" of the rancorous fight may frustrate readers looking for a pro-vaccine polemic. Yet her approach might actually be more likely to sway fearful parents, offering them an alternative set of images and associations to use in thinking about immunization.... Compelling.... This is writing designed to conquer anxiety.
The New Yorker


Biss advocates eloquently for childhood immunization...and understanding the consequences. Her exploration is both historical and emotional.... Biss frankly and optimistically looks at our "unkempt" world and our shared mission to protect one another.
Publishers Weekly


[A] far-reaching and unusual investigation into immunity.... Artfully mixing motherhood, myth, maladies, and metaphors into her presentation, Biss transcends medical science and trepidation
Booklist


National Book Critics Circle Award winner Biss investigates the nature of vaccinations, from immunity as myth to the intricate web of the immune system.... Brightly informative, giving readers a sturdy platform from which to conduct their own research and take personal responsibility.
Kirkus Reviews