![]() Even better, these accounts go beyond the usual leeches-and-mercury tales instead, most of what Morris presents hasn’t had a good exam in decades. It’s more on the playful side, pulling old medical reports from the dust, explaining where needed, and cringing along with readers. No, author Thomas Morris tells, up-front, about every crushed limb, every dynamite burp and pigeon butt in wince-worthy, laughable detail.īut even though these things are humorous from today’s vantage point, Morris pokes fun in a respectful manner that isn’t mean-spirited. ![]() The very first thing you’ll need to know when you find “The Mystery of the Exploding Teeth” is that it’s not a mystery in the sense that you’re used to. They got really, really bad advice and didn’t die. They had things driven into their skulls, and walked away. And if you had a tapeworm, no problem: there’s a trap for that.Īnd yet – we survived, as a species. Arsenic and mercury were common medicines and were often smoked. Pigeon butts were popular in nineteenth-century pediatrics. In the late 1700s, for example, the acid from a crow’s stomach was used in ointment to relieve pain. Life was harder then: there was no anesthesia for any kind of surgery, kidney stones “were far more prevalent,” childbirth was a dicey thing, and being healthy depended on a balance of “humors,” which has nothing to do with laughter.Įven so, some “cures” are downright hilarious, given what we know now. In many cases, diseases that we’ve conquered or can easily treat today were perceived as complete unknowns, two centuries ago. It might’ve tasted terrible and worked only half the time, but hey! It could’ve been worse, as you’ll see in ‘The Mystery of the Exploding Teeth” by Thomas Morris. It might not’ve been exactly pure medical science, but she swore by it. “The Mystery of the Exploding Teeth and Other Curiosities from the History of Medicine”įor every sore throat, broken bone, and cough, she had a remedy. If you think “Perfectly Clear” is a book you’ll like, you’d better believe it. That makes for an excellent real-life love story wrapped up in a psychological thriller that’ll also make you pick your jaw off the floor about every third page. We’re privy to the manipulation she recalls but didn’t notice then, the pressure she felt but dismissed, and the dawning fear that she could never get away. ![]() That leaves a lingering feeling of alarm that continues to run in and out of the rest of this memoir as LeClair (with Robin Gaby Fisher) lets readers see what she did not. It’s a small story compared to what else follows, but its heart-pounding presence in the front of the book takes readers by the scruff and shakes us. It starts with the opening pages, in which author Michelle LeClair is arrested for a crime that never happened, fabricated, she says, by Scientology members. But if you didn’t get scared enough then, “Perfectly Clear” will finish the job perfectly. She questioned even deeper when she fell in love with a woman named Charly. Scientology has long considered homosexuality to be repugnant, she was reminded, and that nagged at her enough to make her question this faith in which she’d been raised. Even after LeClair married and had children, her long-ago fling was flung in her face repeatedly – particularly after she tried to divorce her abusive husband. Īs a teenager, LeClair fooled around once with a female friend, which she had to confess to a fellow Scientologist, information that went into a file. As her career rose, so did the Church’s requests for donations and soon, she was writing astoundingly-frequent five-figure checks to the organization.Īnd it might’ve continued so, if not for one thing. Church members offered her their friendship, but LeClair noticed that she was asked nearly constantly for more money. ![]() Her success – and her mother’s influence – led the Church to invite LeClair to one-on-one member counseling, ostensibly to determine her “purpose on earth,” but also to lead her deeper inside Scientology.
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