Immune

A Journey into the Mysterious System That Keeps You Alive

By: Philipp Dettmer

Narrated by: Steve Taylor

Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins

Publisher's summary

A deep dive into the immune system that will forever change how you think about your body - how it works and why it is both your greatest ally and most dangerous enemy - from the creator of the popular science YouTube channel Kurzgesagt - In a Nutshell.

You wake up and feel a tickle in your throat. Your head hurts. You're mildly annoyed as you get the kids ready for school and dress for work yourself. Meanwhile, an utterly epic war is being fought, just below your skin. Millions are fighting and dying for you to be able to complain as you drink your cup of tea and head out the door.

So what, exactly, is your immune system?

Second only to the human brain in its complexity, it is one of the oldest and most critical facets of life on Earth. Without it, you would die within days. In Immune, Philipp Dettmer, the brains behind the most popular science channel on YouTube, takes listeners on a journey through the fortress of the human body and its defences. There is a constant battle of staggering scale raging within us, full of stories of invasion, strategy, defeat and noble self-sacrifice. In fact, in the time you've been listening to this, your immune system has probably identified and eradicated a cancer cell that started to grow in your body.

Each chapter delves deeply into an element of the immune system, including defences like antibodies and inflammation as well as threats like viruses, bacteria, allergies and cancer, as Dettmer reveals why boosting your immune system is actually nonsense, how parasites sneak their way past your body's defences, how viruses - including the coronavirus - work and what goes on in your wounds when you cut yourself.

Enlivened by immersive descriptions, Immune turns one of the most intricate, interconnected and confusing subjects - immunology - into a gripping adventure through an astonishing alien landscape.

Challenging what you know and think about your own body and how it defends you against all sorts of maladies and how it might also eventually be your own downfall, Immune is a vital and remarkably fun crash course in what is arguably, and increasingly, the most important system in the body.

©2021 Philipp Dettmer (P)2021 Hodder & Stoughton Limited

Critic reviews

"A truly brilliant introduction to the human body's vast system for fighting infections and other threats." (John Green, number one New York Times best-selling author of The Fault in Our Stars)

"Reads as if it's a riveting sci-fi novel...a delightful treat for the curious." (Tim Urban, creator of Wait but Why) 

OMG!!

Download. Listen. Thank me later.

Excellent work by all involved
Perfect way to get a head start in immunology

Thorough and plain-English without dumbing it down

Captures the complexity of the immune system in an engaging and informative fashion without making the listener/ reader feel as though they're being spoken down to. A wonderfully up-to-date guide to our immune systems and much needed resource in the modern world. Dettmer's performance is excellent and his voice a soothing guide through this vast topic.

Loved the Humour and Information

I loved the humour that was involved while still delivering so much information. I am particularly grateful for the short summaries that occurred throughout the book and enjoyed listening as I went through my daily tasks.

Incredible

This audiobook has opened my eyes to the world of immunology and I have learnt many things from it. I am grateful that this exists and even more grateful now to my immune system which keeps me alive.

This audiobook made things easier to understand with examples given throughout to compare.

This is my first audiobook and my experience of it was incredible.

immunology for dummies

if you are a medical student or any student or person interested in knowing how the immune system works, this is the place to start. thank you.

Amazing book about such a wonderful topic

The way it's written makes it easy to understand logically and see the whole perspective. Wonderful humour and metaphors, scientific terms made easy to work with.

Great!

It's great! Philipp you did a great job on this book and the rest of Kurzgesagt did a great job in the videos about it!

A must listen to

In an era of misinformation running rampant in social media this book is a must to listen to as it explains in simplified terms how the immune system works and using nice analogies explain in a layman’s language complex interactions and actors of this fantastic and complex system: our immune system

Just wonderful.

A really incredible insight and so well made. such friendly language and tone. Not something I would normally read and loved it.

In a slightly bigger nutshell

Amazing book I can recommend to my parents who’d understand the complexity better than any other book on this topic and with this depth