Everything in Its Place

First Loves and Last Tales

By: Oliver Sacks

Narrated by: Dan Woren

Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins

Publisher's summary

From the best-selling author of Gratitude and On the Move, a final volume of essays that showcase Sacks's broad range of interests - from his passion for ferns, swimming, and horsetails, to his final case histories exploring schizophrenia, dementia, and Alzheimer's.

Oliver Sacks, scientist and storyteller, is beloved for his neurological case histories and his fascination and familiarity with human behavior at its most unexpected and unfamiliar. Everything in Its Place is a celebration of Sacks' myriad interests, told with his characteristic compassion and erudition, and in his luminous prose.

Includes a PDF with the bibliography, permission and acknowledgements, and a note about the author.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2019 Oliver Sacks (P)2019 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“In this lovely collection of previously unpublished essays, the late, celebrated author and neurologist muses on his career, his youth, the mental health field and much more.... Sacks’s gentle, ruminative voice is a slave when investigating difficult subject matter but there are plenty of lighter moments as well...[this] final collection is a treat for the chronically curious.” (Publisher’s Weekly)

“Extraordinarily touching - not lacking in his habitual energy and driven curiosity, but somehow vulnerable, even fragile.... [He was] an unusual boy, one who had, as he puts it, an 'overwhelming sense of Truth and Beauty'...and it becomes increasingly clear that Sacks was that boy to the very end of his days, engaging, eagerly and with a never-ending sense of wonder, not only with science but with its history and the people who made it.... Our best chance for the future, we may feel, is that there may be others among us like this uncommon, passionate, and enlightened man.” (Simon Callow, The New York Review of Books)

“Sacks further secures his legacy with this most recent collection of his work.... The Shakespeare of science writing might suffice, but Sacks ultimately defies comparison to bygone or even contemporary authors. As readers we can rejoice that, while cancer may have claimed his body, his voice continues to ring out.” (The Scientist)

8/10

I love Oliver Sacks. I understand this was somewhat of a reflection. I didn’t love that it jumped from one unrelated topic to another. Some parts more interesting than others. Overall 8/10.

Oliver Sacks is gone

This was a great ending to life devoted to science and the understanding of the human condition . I enjoyed it thoroughly because of the content, it’s accessibility, and because of the profound insights that Sacks gives as a goodbye.

Fitting finale

Oliver Sacks' last book is a wonderfully mixed bag or reminiscences and fascinating detours. Topics range from science museums, Humphry Davy, the Kew Gardens, and the joys of herring to tidbits of case histories involving a man in stasis at 62 degrees F and how nature can calm Tourretting. Godspeed, Oliver.

An Excellent Memoir

Dr. Sacks provides another wonderful deep dive into his diverse knowledge base. Highly recommend.

An amazing man with a depth & breadth of knowledge

Insightful, engaging and approachable. Not a dry academic commentary, though few can march his scientific and medical credentials. Oliver Sack's overcame many obstacles in his own life, but despite his remarkable achievements he retained an endearing humility and compassion toward his fellow humans.

Masterful

This was a masterful collection of essays which made me think and moved my heart. Oliver Sacks wrote this excellent book on the human brain to cap an exception career. His book is easy for a lay person to understand, I highly recommend it.

Thoughtful

Rambling memoir but good rambling. Covers a wide variety of subjects. Narrator is good. 👍

Amazing Content - Wrong Reader

Oliver Sacks was a true gem of a writer and thinker. I really enjoyed these essays. Unfortunately, the narrator was not a good choice. While competent, he sounded like Casey Kasem reading the weekly top 40, a jarring difference in tone than what the gentle, thoughtful, material called for.

The weakest Sacks collection is better than the best of many

If you’ve never read Oliver Sacks, don’t start here. But if you love Sacks, and keep your expectations in check, you’ll enjoy this. It’s a lot of book reviews, smaller essays that didn’t quite germinate into something more, and pleasant reflections from an older man looking back at his life and the world. It is good, but not his best.

Missing Sacks

I have read and enjoyed several of Oliver Sack's books, but none as much as this collection of essays and musings. Sacks was clearly a brilliant man, but also very human and in touch with the miriad of human conditions. His writing is both informative and entertaining and the last few entries saddened me immensely. I highly recommend this book to everyone.