Fifty Shades of Gray Matter by Teresella Gondolo, MD

Fifty Shades of Gray Matter
by Teresella Gondolo, MD

ISBN-13: 9781639887798
Paperback: 382 pages
Publisher: Atmosphere Press
Released: May 2, 2023

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Neurology is more than treating headaches and strokes. The brain, which has produced all of mankind's art and literature and inventions, can also conjure monsters and nightmares and sexual predators. It can upend lives with a myriad of chemical neurotransmitters coursing through millions of synapses. Each brain is its own unique world, its own reality. The brain can be a confining prison, or a dizzying and limitless cosmos.


My Review:
Fifty Shades of Gray Matter describes a series of cases showing the type of people that visit a neurologist. It's not really a scientific look at the brain but more philosophical musing about how brain disorders affect people. The book had short chapters, each featuring a different patient and their family, as the disorder affected others. She gave some background on the people and why they came to her then briefly gave her diagnosis of what was wrong and what medicine she prescribed. Some of the problems were caused by medication. The more scientific information of the brain was relegated to a few pages in the back, briefly describing a few of the mentioned diseases in terms of what's gone wrong in the brain. While interesting in it's way, I'd expected more of a focus on the brain than on the people.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.