Let’s Read For Fun: Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy by Mary Roach

Hey Funners -

Our selection for January 2026 is, Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy by club favorite, science journalist Mary Roach. The book is a Peak Pick from the Seattle Public Library, so you might be able to check it out at your local branch.

From the publisher:
The body is the most complex machine in the world, and the only one for which you cannot get a replacement part from the manufacturer. For centuries, medicine has reached for what’s available—sculpting noses from brass, borrowing skin from frogs and hearts from pigs, crafting eye parts from jet canopies and breasts from petroleum by-products. Today we’re attempting to grow body parts from scratch using stem cells and 3D printers. How are we doing? Are we there yet?

Sounds like classic Roach! But I interrupted...

In Replaceable You, Mary Roach explores the remarkable advances and difficult questions prompted by the human body’s failings. When and how does a person decide they’d be better off with a prosthetic than their existing limb? Can a donated heart be made to beat forever? Can an intestine provide a workable substitute for a vagina?

Mary Roach is curious, compassionate, and endlessly entertaining; always read the footnotes, that’s often where the funniest stuff resides.

Roach recently sat down with her friend Roman Mars on the 99% Invisible Podcast: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/642-replaceable-you/ if you want to do some bonus research before reading the book.

As always, you don’t have to finish the book to participate, but there will likely be spoilers (there always are).