The Emperor of All Maladies

Siddhartha Mukherjee, a physician and oncologist, tells the history of cancer as a biography of the disease, alongside his own years as a hematology and oncology fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital. He begins with its first identification by the Egyptian physician Imhotep some 4,600 years ago then turns to Galen's theory of black bile, William Halsted's radical mastectomy and Emil Grubbe's use of X-rays. In the 20th century he follows Sidney Farber's temporary remissions in childhood leukemia and the campaign by Farber and Mary Lasker that led to the National Cancer Act of 1971. Written in response to a patient who needed to know what was being fought, it received the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.

James Clear recommended it highly to anyone curious about science, history or how cancer is treated.