Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

At its heart, this is the story of the Lacks family and the cell line that was spawned from one woman, Henrietta Lacks. It is also the story, in a vague sense, of what the research done on those cells meant to her daughter, Deborah Lacks. It purports to be more than this, and many have willingly, indeed gladly, swallowed those claims, but I think that they lack support. For example, it purports to be about the history of medicine, but it is not. Rather, it discusses events that took place at one institution (Johns Hopkins Hospital) in one time frame, and then distorts them and seeks to make the reader form broad generalizations about scientists and doctors, and their actions and morals. For example, in the beginning of the book, where Henrietta goes to Johns Hopkins to be diagnosed, Rebbecca Skloot seems to relish mentioning the fact that Henrietta Lacks was in the colored ward. At the very least, she takes every possible opportunity to work it into the story, along with the fact that she was African-American and her doctors were white. These facts are, quite honestly, completely incidental to the story. If you read this book, the people with whom Rebbecca Skloot spoke reliably mentioned that she received the standard of care for her time, regardless of her race. Despite this fact, Ms. Skloot goes out of her way to mention that, quite often, patient care was different for African-Americans than whites. In every way, Rebbecca Skloot seems to have sought out anything that would provoke outrage in readers. In the end, it is not clear, whether this was a result of Rebbecca Skloot framing her book in this fashion to win the approval and trust of the family (which may or may not have been necessary to receive their permission for printing) or whether it was a malicious gambit to improve sales. By the end, I found the book obnoxious on many levels. First, the vilification of scientists and doctors who are providing the standard of care, calling into question their intentions and actions without even allowing most of them (or their families) to speak on their behalf, combined with her constant framing of Henrietta's treatment as a race issue, which it clearly wasn't if you are paying attention, seems guaranteed to cast the doctors in the light of the villain, while Henrietta's family, with their self-imposed medical conditions, as victims of the doctors, society, and, well, everyone but themselves. Second, the repetition of the stories about Johns Hopkins doctors "stealing" patients off of the street (who were inevitably characterized as African-Americans, as opposed to the white doctors), without bothering to look up something as simple as the number of people who were reported missing near Johns Hopkins to similar urban neighborhoods without a major research and medical clinic, shows, clearly, her bias and intent. I guess, though, that would merely give her the opportunity to claim that most people weren't reported missing because they were poor African-Americans, and the white police didn't want to take the missing persons reports. <Rolls eyes> Third, the vilification of scientists, was annoying beyond measure. Many, many times in the course of the book, Rebbecca Skloot would present ridiculous headlines fron the past, where a member of the press would dramatically misunderstand the findings of a scientist and would make some insane, sordid claim that would instill a greater fear of science into lay people. Admittedly, this is also the fault of the scientists involved, as they really need to do a better job of making sure that the press understands the story. (Which won't stop the press and journalists from misrepresenting it ANYWAY, but may stop some accidents, at least.) And that is really where this book lets us down, as we have to sit through the exaggerated claims that are in this book. But, in the end, I guess that is the difference between journalists and scientists. Scientists PROVE things, journalists SELL things. Fourth, as a good example of this framing problem, Rebbecca Skloot spends three or so pages talking about the sociopathic behavior that a disgraced scientist exhibited, including a support for eugenics. While it is true that there were some scientists that were in favor of eugenics, there were others, including Thomas Hunt Morgan, who spoke out, vehemently, against the practice. Moreover, it is blatantly misleading to paint eugenics as a solely scientific endeavor. Rather, it included such luminaries as Sir Francis Galton (an anthropologist and statistician), H.G. Wells, Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt, future Prime Minister Winston Churchill, Emile Zola (a novelist), economists John Keynes, Irving Fisher, and Sidney Webb, and, notably, the journalists George Bernard Shaw and Lothrop Stoddard (and probably a lot more, but journalists don't tend to make history like people who DO things). None of this makes the practice, supported by so many scientists, any more excusable. If anything, their participation is what gave it such awful credibility, and they bear more responsbility than anyone. Nevertheless, none of these figures are mentioned, nor is the overwhelming popularity of the movement, worldwide. A little context would have been nice. As I said at the outset, the irresponsible and inaccurate framing of the cultural surroundings of the book mar the story and make it impossible to really understand what happened and why. In the end, readers are left with an unjustified sense of outrage, and little new learned. At least, little that is accurate.