• The Family That Couldn't Sleep

  • A Medical Mystery
  • By: D.T. Max
  • Narrated by: Grover Gardner
  • Length: 8 hrs and 45 mins
  • 4.2 out of 5 stars (479 ratings)

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The Family That Couldn't Sleep  By  cover art

The Family That Couldn't Sleep

By: D.T. Max
Narrated by: Grover Gardner
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Publisher's summary

For 200 years, a noble Venetian family has suffered from an inherited disease that strikes their members in middle age, stealing their sleep, eating holes in their brains, and ending their lives in a matter of months. In Papua New Guinea, a primitive tribe is nearly obliterated by a sickness whose chief symptom is uncontrollable laughter. Across Europe, millions of sheep rub their fleeces raw before collapsing. In England, cows attack their owners in the milking parlors, while in the American West, thousands of deer starve to death in fields full of grass.

What these strange conditions, including fatal familial insomnia, kuru, scrapie, and mad cow disease, share is their cause: prions. Prions are ordinary proteins that sometimes "go wrong", resulting in neurological illnesses that are always fatal. Even more mysterious and frightening, prions are almost impossible to destroy because they are not alive and have no DNA. And the diseases they bring are now spreading around the world.

In The Family That Couldn't Sleep, essayist and journalist D. T. Max tells the spellbinding story of the prion's hidden past and deadly future. Through exclusive interviews and original archival research, Max explains this story's connection to human greed and ambition, from the Prussian chemist Justus von Liebig, who made cattle meatier by feeding them the flesh of other cows, to New Guinean natives whose custom of eating the brains of the dead nearly wiped them out.

The biologists who have investigated these afflictions are just as extraordinary. They include Daniel Carleton Gajdusek, a self-described "pedagogic pedophiliac pediatrician" who cracked kuru and won the Nobel Prize, and another Nobel winner, Stanley Prusiner, a driven, feared self-promoter who identified the key protein that revolutionized prion study.

©2006 D.T. Max (P)2006 Tantor Media, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Very timely and compellingly written." (Booklist)

What listeners say about The Family That Couldn't Sleep

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Both Entertaining & Educational

This book not only tells the story of fatal familial insomnia, but it also explains the history and research on proteins that won't properly fold. The whole book is superbly interesting and much of the science is explained in ways that are easy to understand.

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    3 out of 5 stars

Interesting, but could have been better

heard about this book (and the issues it addresses online). it's a very interesting story, but it rambles and jumps around a little to much for me to say it's a great book. very interesting to learn about if you want to know about prions

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fascinating book.

It is so intriguing. this book perfectly ties everything together to explain different people around the world throughout history to explain prions. I wanted to keep listening. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

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Fascinating overview on the history of prions, its victims and researchers

Excellent narration and scientific approach to prions and the various diseases both in animals and humans.

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tragic but amazing story

although this story is told of a tragic and unlucky family. the author does an amazing job at researching the background and making it less about the family and more about understanding prions and the disease.

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Objective and engaging

I read Dr. Prusiner's book before this one. Prusiner is a brilliant scientist and his book is worth a read if you are interested in Prion diseases, but it becomes difficult to appreciate the science behind his ego.
This book, on the other hand is much more objective and engaging. The author is obviously a better writer and has done enough research to provide accurate descriptions of the science without feeling like a scientific paper. He gives credit where credit is due to numerous researchers, including Prusiner; but is also sure to mention their short comings both scientifically and personally (where appropriate). The added story telling and patient perspective gives another layer, providing emotional depth to the interesting science.

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Strays from The Main Title

Good book but is more about prion diseases than focusing on what the title states.

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Great book

One of my all time favorites! I’ve listened 3 times, soaking up all of the information. Recommended by This Podcast Will Kill You.

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Fascinating!

This book is a very thorough and informative on the subject of Prion diseases.
I have heard about mad cow and the condition known as Familia Fatal Insomnia but had no idea they were related! The author covered all related conditions very well and the reader did an excellent job! great first book for my Audible subscription!

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Very Interesting

Well written story that delves into a topic that I had seen only in headlines and brief descriptions. This book dives into the history and scientific understanding of prions. I would highly recommend this book.

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