Many tales you've likely heard bits of before, but they make up a repulsive collection of bad takes in medicine over the centuries. Missing here are the straight up heinous acts against Black people and other races while doctors tried to figure things out ( )

DNF. I got a ways into this and realized that I would not get anything out of it. ( )

Had to read this in small doses. Imperative - so much to take in.

What a fascinating, crazy, weird, disgusting, mental, fun, remarkable read.

I thought I was gullible through the years! Nope.

Also, shows how cruel and manipulative people can be when given the chance. And it’s still going on - all the crazy “remedies” going around when Covid hit.

Highly recommend if you like shaking your head in disbelief a lot. ( )

Hilarious! I enjoyed this book so much. I wish I could be able to read a book of quackery from our time in a couple of hundreds of years. ( )

Often gross, but always interesting, this book looks at all the weird and crazy things humans have tried in order to cure illness. ( )

This was a very fun and, often very gross, record of defunct medical practices through the ages. Clearly, it is not an exhaustive list but it does run through quite a lot of medical charlatans, miscalculations and just plain mistakes through medical history. It is also written to be humorous, as one may have guessed with a title like "Quackery," so it takes a light tone and is very entertaining. I can now say that I know why we have the saying "don't blow smoke up my a**" and it is even weirder than I thought. lol! A very fun read that I highly recommend. ( )

What a wonderful, snarky and humorous review of Quackery in society. Unfortunately quackery continues even today as thousands have died during the Covid pandemic by trying alternative cures. A must read; though one should be warned if one take offense to sexual content. Otherwise go for it. ( )

Why two stars? For a history book, it completely lacks sources. You don't know where the information used in this book counts from and therefore could be completely made up. So I subtracted two stars. I also subtracted a star because I've read most of this in other books with better explanations and illustrations and without the atrocious commentary.

This was not a horrible book but the lack of sources, the style of writing, and the atrocious commentary leave very much to be desired. Decent if you want a general overview of quackery but little else. ( )

snake oil medicine, quack doctors, history of medicine

Some interesting facts, but mostly obscured by the heavy-handed jocular informal tone ( )

The subtitle pretty much tells what this book is about. What to know all the health benefits of mercury, radium, arsenic and strychnine? That’s just the start! Of course, there is also a look at bloodletting and leeches, and much much more.

This is told with humour and plenty of fun illustrations from the past. Very interesting stuff. Some of what they look at here were things doctors actually did, but some other things were what the “quacks” were selling. Unfortunately, I’m not sure how much I’ll remember. It looks at so many different things in short bursts of information, but was definitely interesting as I read it. The authors are a doctor and a journalist. ( )

Equal parts mortifying, morbid and fascinating, Quackery is a guided tour through the horrifying world of medicine and health care in days gone by. I eat these kinds of books up like candy, who doesn't like lurid trivia of the not-so-good ol' days? I know I do! I really liked the layout, it's akin to my favorite magazine, Mental Floss with little factoids on every page to highlight the subject. Very well organized, full of stomach turning stories of medical mistakes and maladies, it kept me turning pages and very thankful I live in the modern day.

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This is more of a 3.5 book than a true four. It was informative and a fun read and I took three things away from it: 1) thank God I live in an era where most of these treatments have been disproven 2) the use of BCE and CE annoy me and 3) if I can tell what your political leanings are in a book not specifically about your political leanings, I’m going to knock a half star off my rating. That being said, I’d definitely recommend it to anyone interested in the odder side of medical history. ( )

Light and fun medical history reading. ( )

Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything by Lydia Kang is a fascinating book with plenty of disgusting ideas that posed as treatments in the past. I liked the interesting ways the author presented the information. Presented cleverly and humorously, despite most treatments or cures were deadly or very gross or painful!
I learned where some saying he originated from! Wow, not what I expected! I would not want to have drowned in the 1800 century! Haha! You will have to read this to find out! I can't write it, the cure is so odd, Goodreads and Amazon wouldn't post my review!
This is definitely an interesting read, especially for me being a RN. If you know someone in the health field, they might enjoy this too! ( )

Often gross, but always interesting, this book looks at all the weird and crazy things humans have tried in order to cure illness. ( )

A good overview of some of the weirdest and most confusing ways that we've been trying to cure things over the lifetime of humanity. Thank goodness for the scientific method!
This book is written in a really casual and understandable style, a bit dorky and jokey. I think it's good for an overview, and anything that I wanted more in-depth information on I looked up later. ( )

A fascinating but humorous look at some of the stupidest attempts and ways we tried to cure medicine throughout history. Mostly about 'quack doctors' and how they preyed on the innocent and desperate. A fun lively sense of humor from the co-authors makes it a quick and easy and fun read. ( )

Fascinating. Highly recommend this book to people intrigued by the invention of modern medicine or writers. Definitely a book for writers.

Fun book! Jam packed with information that will make you squirm, and also make you question every health fad you ever hear of. And that's something you should definitely do. Seriously. ( )

Quackery by Lydia Kang, MD and Nate Pedersen delves deep into dubious medical practices and panaceas. From using Mercury to cure Syphilis and other ailments to the wonders and terrors of radiation, this book doesn’t really hold back on what it does. Some of the methods and medicines come from the desire to live forever, while others wanted a simple cure for a great many other diseases.

Kang and Pedersen write in an understandable style, replete with examples; terrifying examples. Also, some of the people honestly thought that the things they recommended would aid the patient. Take Benjamin Rush for instance. He signed the Declaration of Independence and was a True Founding Father. He also thought that everything could be cured by using a purgative. Needless to say, he lost a lot of clients.

There isn’t really much else to say. The book is great and due to my reading of a lot of different things, I am aware of some of the strange techniques used to cure things. There are some that I had not considered though. Take the King’s Touch for instance. I had forgotten that due to the Divine Right of Kings the peasantry thought that the touch of a King could cure maladies and ailments. Really interesting stuff. I would say that some of the images are not for the faint of heart, but I suppose that if you saw the whole title it might put you off reading it. ( )

A laugh every paragraph despite the grim subject matter. Highly recommended! ( )

This was very informative. I read it one evening. The author's sense of humor adds a lot to the book, but gets old at times. There were things I already knew, such as the thought in the early 20th century that radium cured everything. I was able to skip that part and not lose the gist of the book. All in all, a wonderful book with a ton of knowledge I will retain. ( )

If you like Mary Roach’s works, you’ll probably enjoy this compendium of wacky, revolting, and occasionally dangerous “cures” from the past.

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