Recomended for any student of Biological sciences. During my first degree (Biochemistry & Mol. Biology), this was one of the best and most user-friendly of textbooks. Placed next to Stryer and Voet & Voet. Though still relevant, it is begining to date and I would encourage the authors do a revised edition covering the past twenty years.

Can be understood by nonscientists. This book is best appreciated by aspiring biologist. Book lacks most current information concerning genetics, i.e. Gene Cloning and the Human Genome Project. Overall is an outstanding easy read that accurately covers many important concepts in genetics.

Rosenfield's book stands out among mountains of books published on the trendy topic of mind and memory. Here he offers a most cogent argument, in the tradition of Hughlings-Jackson and Freud, against localizationist views, popular in the last century, now revived under the disguise of connectionist/computational models. As a historian of ideas, Rosenfield reports with vigor and clarity and classical precision; as a philosopher of mind (for that is what he is) he reasons with astonishing penetration and subtlety. Though this book might not get the attention it deserves today, as it is in many ways against the mainstream, mechanical conceptions of the mind, I have no doubt that it will eventually contribute to a emerging psychology of consciousness that does not flee from reality in search of simplistic ways of explanation.

It is surprising that this novel got on the New York Times's list of notable books of the year 2000. It does not work on almost every level.

First of all, it is supposed to be a satire. According to my dictionary a satire is "a literary work in which human vice or folly is attacked through irony, derision or wit." Unfortunately, I could not find much irony, derision or wit in the novel. It trudges along, and its deliberately scientific language and formality do not create any satirical effect at all.

Secondly, the novel wants to educate and satirize at the same time. It was quite confusing and tiring for this reader to figure out when to take a fact at face value and when to assume that it was made up. Education goes well with gentle wit and straightforwardness. Satire works best when something is exaggerated and distorted (in this respect, satire is similar to caricature). Blending the educational and the satirical is bound to be difficult. There are examples of a successful blend (take Chapter 6 of Julian Barnes's "Flaubert's Parrot"), but not in this book.

Thirdly, structure. The novel is not - as the blurb claims - "a magical blending" but rather a messy blunder. It sags under the burden of distracting, long-winded side-stories. The storyline is burdened by deviations into the life of two rapists, an illegitimate granddaughter of Freud, and Mr. Eiffel (of Eiffel Tower fame). For what purpose? What is the joke? I don't get it.

Fourthly, characterization. Satire needs a target worth of derision. Since Freud is no longer on the pedestal on which some academics have put him, he does not really qualify as a target. And what about his disciples? Yes, definitely worthy targets. But then the author should have built up at least one fully developed character that deserves ridicule. He failed to do so, however. The narrator and the characters of the book are quite bland and one-dimensional.

There is never a moment in which the book achieves the magic of fiction, which is to suspend the reader's belief in the fictional nature of what he reads. The beauty and power of fiction, in this reader's opinion, lie in its manipulative power: to make us believe (paradoxically) that the fiction we read is "real" although we know it is fiction. Yes, I want to be deceived! In particular by a book where the theme of self-deception (an excellent choice for the theme of a novel, by the way!) figures so prominently.

Bottom line: a very unsatisfying, annoying and tedious book.

The theory's sort of cute, albeit reductive, and I understand why Rosenfield wanted to use Freud for it -- but it's silly, the book, overall. It's neither great fiction nor great philosophy (let alone science). I found it entertaining, but if a book like this is really to succeed, it should also be enlightening. It is not.

This reimagining of Freud's last days and his lately discovered "Megalomania Manuscript" is an electric gem that spins off sparks that flash on Adorno, Reich, Fromm, Szasz, Bateson, Watzlawick, Hofsteader, and dozens of other twenthieth century thinkers who would likely shudder to find their names in a sentence with Freud. Oh and there's W.H.R. Rivers and the war poets too (check out Pat Barker). What a fun and fertile imaginative stroll. Thanks.