TX Geologist

Pandemics, but Mostly Cholera

Revisado: 03-04-20

The author attempts to address modern communicable disease outbreaks through the lens of Cholera. She traces the history of Cholera from its emergence in Ganges-Brahmaputra Delta in the late 18th century, through 19th century London and New York, to the recent outbreak in Haiti. She stops at various points to discuss (in much less detail) other disease outbreaks such as SARS/MERS, Ebola, and MRSA.

Her story is interesting, but seems more focused (perhaps given the Cholera-centric framework of the narrative) on critiquing modern, industrial, capitalist, technological society and it's role in inadvertently promoting the spread of disease. To me this seems a stilted and highly-selective interpretation of medical history. Her most cogent criticism of modern medicine(/society) is thinking that our successes against communicable disease are in some way final.

The narrator of the book is not engaging. The narration is dry, nearly monotone, and without the least enthusiasm for the topic.

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Not Worthwhile

Revisado: 02-05-20

This title is a compilation of three of Captivating History's titles. I thought I'd try this compilation out to broaden my knowledge of these ancient civilizations. Unfortunately, I feel like I've been listening to someone's poorly-written high school term paper. I never felt like the author's had any grasp of the subject matter, let alone were presenting it in a "captivating" way. You could learn more in less time from each civilization's Wikipedia page. The narration is reasonably enthusiastic and engaging, but is riddled with horrible mispronunciations (e.g. Cilician pronounced as to sound like "silicon".)

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Extremely Dated

Revisado: 02-05-20

There's nothing really wrong with the overall content of this audiobook if you're interested in what we knew about the ancient Assyrians during the last decades of the 19th century. The author, the eminent biblical historian George Rawlinson, died in 1902. Unfortunately, the golden age of middle eastern archaeology didn't start until about 20 years after his death. This makes the content extremely dated and ill-informed. The audio book is not helped by the dry narration with numerous mispronunciations.

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Needs a PDF Companion with the Pictures

Revisado: 11-03-14

This audiobook interesting list of sights to see in Europe, but it primarily revolves are photos not included with the audiobook. Based on the structure of the narrative, I surmise that the intent was to include such a document. Until it appears I wouldn't waste your money on this audiobook.

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