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A review by suncoyote
The Survivors Club: The Secrets and Science That Could Save Your Life by Ben Sherwood
2.0
It's official: I'm giving up on nonfiction. After reading Supersense I'm discovering a dearth of solid content. What is Sherwood's point? Is his point that we're all survivors? No, wait, his point is that some people are just lucky! No, wait his point is that some people make their own luck! No, wait his point is that we all have strengths!
For the love of god, quit pulling punches! Just tell me: "You are coddled in your safe, cashmere life and if disaster ever struck you'd be the sucker gaping at the lava rolling down the mountain and die with your food still unchewed." But, no, instead Sherwood spend 2/3rds of the book gently reassuring us that bad things happen, but some people just seem to live! So, don't worry, all you need is to do is eject out of a plane at mach 3, then lay in the ocean overnight and then "muster up this one last surge of strength" to survive until the morning. As if everything really just counted on darn luck and a will to not drown. I want the stories about the people who use their wits and wiles to defeat the greatest tragedies. Where is the story about the person who gets trapped in a bear trap and gnaws off their arm? Where are the stories of women who wrestle crocodiles? Where are the stories of heroism because people did more than just decide they were going to live--they took action? Where are those stories? Because they are, most assuredly, not in this book.
(Also, ps., that code you provided in the book jacket to allow readers to take the online survivor profile test only works once--and whoever figured out how to read the code through the library protective covering, like me, already used it.)
For the love of god, quit pulling punches! Just tell me: "You are coddled in your safe, cashmere life and if disaster ever struck you'd be the sucker gaping at the lava rolling down the mountain and die with your food still unchewed." But, no, instead Sherwood spend 2/3rds of the book gently reassuring us that bad things happen, but some people just seem to live! So, don't worry, all you need is to do is eject out of a plane at mach 3, then lay in the ocean overnight and then "muster up this one last surge of strength" to survive until the morning. As if everything really just counted on darn luck and a will to not drown. I want the stories about the people who use their wits and wiles to defeat the greatest tragedies. Where is the story about the person who gets trapped in a bear trap and gnaws off their arm? Where are the stories of women who wrestle crocodiles? Where are the stories of heroism because people did more than just decide they were going to live--they took action? Where are those stories? Because they are, most assuredly, not in this book.
(Also, ps., that code you provided in the book jacket to allow readers to take the online survivor profile test only works once--and whoever figured out how to read the code through the library protective covering, like me, already used it.)