Anaesthesia: The Gift Of Oblivion, The Mystery Of Consciousness

Author: Kate Cole-Adams

Stock information

General Fields

  • : $32.99 AUD
  • : 9781925498202
  • : Text Publishing Company
  • : Text Publishing Company
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  • : 0.542
  • : April 2017
  • : 234mm X 153mm
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  • : June 2017
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  • : books

Special Fields

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  • : Kate Cole-Adams
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  • : Paperback
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  • : English
  • : 617.96
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Barcode 9781925498202
9781925498202

Description

Winner, 2017 Mark and Evette Moran Nib Literary Award


You know how it is when you go under. The jab, the countdown, the--
--and then you wake.
This book is about what happens in between.


Until a hundred and seventy years ago many people chose death over the ordeal of surgery. Now hundreds of thousands undergo operations every day. Anaesthesia has made it possible.


But how much do we really know about what happens to us on the operating table? Can we hear what''s going on around us? Is pain still pain if we are not awake to feel it, or don''t remember it afterwards? How does the unconscious mind deal with the body''s experience of being cut open and ransacked? And how can we help ourselves through it?


Haunting, lyrical, sometimes shattering, Anaesthesialeavens science with personal experience to bring an intensely human curiosity to the unknowable realm beyond consciousness.


What really happens to us when we are anaesthetised? By this I mean not what happens to the pinging, crackling apparatus of our nerves and spinal cords and brains, but what happens to us--to the person who is me or the person who is you--as doctors go about the messy business of slicing and delving within us?


Kate Cole-Adamsis a Melbourne writer and journalist. Her non-fiction work Anaesthesiawon the Mark and Evette Moran Nib Literary Award, 2017 and the 2017 Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists Media Award. It was shortlisted for the Victorian Premier''s Literary Award for Non-fiction, 2017. Her novel Walking to the Moonis also published by Text.


''Anaesthesiais mesmerising...This rich and thorough study looks more deeply into questions about the nature of consciousness than many of us who undergo an anaesthetic are likely, or willing, to ponder.'' Australian Book Review


''A work of splendid richness and depth, driven by a curiosity so intense that it hazards at times the extreme boundaries of the sayable.'' Helen Garner


''Kate Cole-Adams has been fascinated with our funny non-being during surgery for a long time, and Anaesthesiafeels like a book that''s taken over a decade to write, which it is. It also feels like you''re having a decade''s worth of conversations with a dogged, but generous and resourceful thinker, with someone (she is both a journalist and a novelist) who can crack open a complex idea, and then run with it.'' Readings


''Extraordinarily well-researched and delicately structured, this is a book with few parallels. Exceptional writing illuminates a topic that affects most of us, but that few of us understand.'' Judges'' Report, Victorian Premier''s Literary Awards, 2018


''Comfortably numb. A close-up look at anaesthesia is equal parts social history, popular science and report on experience.'' NZ Listener


''Anaesthesiais not just an account of medical research but a poetic exploration of the mysteries of the human mind.'' Australian


''Should be compulsory reading for all anaesthetists, others responsible for the care of surgical patients, and medical students who wish to achieve a true perspective of today''s anaesthesia.'' medicSA


''Cole-Adams''s prose is sinuous, at times intoxicating, and witty.'' Sydney Morning Herald


''A troubling, anxious subject that most of us would rather avoid or deflect with dark humour. Cole-Adams has illuminated it in a memorable way. The book is a gift not of oblivion but of awareness.'' Inside Story


''For the interested reader, it''s an outline of the science, with an emphasis on the unknown. For the practitioner, it''s a patient experience, eloquently expressed. There''s much more the anaesthesia than meets the eye, and this book provides a glimpse into the depths.'' Conversation


''A fascinating mix of historical background, moving--sometimes shocking--surgical stories, interviews with experts and case studies. Surprisingly, it seems relatively little is really known about exactly how effective and affective anaesthetic is. Despite that, I found this book an oddly reassuring study.'' North and South NZ


''Kate Cole-Adams has written a book that defies familiar categories. It is a personal memoir, a history, a scientific study, and a philosophical enquiry into the unconscious, and by drawing all these strands together the author has delivered a masterpiece.'' Jamie Grant, head judge, Waverley Council Nib Literary Awards


''This is a surprising delight of a book about the invention and use of anaesthetics, but it is also about the concept of consciousness. It is a book about the fear of death, the fear of a lack of control, the fear of an imminent operation, the way a life can be plagued by a general feeling of anxiety and how dreams play a part in this.'' Krissy Kneen, Feminist Writers Festival, Favourite Reads of 2017


''Kate Cole-Adams''s Anaesthesiapropelled me towards new ways of thinking about thinking itself: experience and consciousness and how we make in and make up this world.'' Ashley Hay, Australian, Books of the Year 2017

Promotion info

* Extract in major weekend supplements in Australia and New Zealand * Radio interviews - RN & ABC local in every Australian city, and on Radio New Zealand * Extensive reviews in newspapers and literary magazines * Magazine coverage including in women's, health and lifestyle magazines * Online extract/interview Mamamia, Guardian, body + soul, daily life, health podcasts. * Large online marketing campaign including audience-targeted advertising with Fairfax and wide distribution of chapter samplers via Facebook * Advertising in the Monthly, ABR and the Big Issue * Printed chapter sample booklet available before publication (ask your rep) * Early reading copies available to the trade * Significant budget for bookseller catalogues including airport chains * Feature title in Text newsletters, website and social media campaigns * Author will be a guest of major Festivals

Awards

Winner of Mark and Evette Moran Nib Literary Award 2017 (Australia). Short-listed for Victorian Premier's Literary Award for Non-fiction 2017 (Australia).

Reviews

'The prose is quite gorgeous-simultaneously tough and tender.' Adelaide Advertiser on Walking to the Moon 'A work of splendid richness and depth, driven by a curiosity so intense that it hazards at times the extreme boundaries of the sayable.' -- Helen Garner

Author description

Kate Cole-Adams is a Melbourne journalist. Her novel Walking to the Moon is published by Text.