About book Five Quarts: A Personal And Natural History Of Blood (2005)
My review published in the San Francisco Chronicle in 2005:Digressions on blood, the fluid of lifeReviewed by Steve KettmannSunday, February 6, 2005Five Quarts A Personal and Natural History of Blood By Bill Hayes BALLANTINE BOOKS; 290 PAGES; $23.95 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------San Francisco writer Bill Hayes is on his way to becoming one of those rare authors who can tackle just about any subject in book form, and make you glad he did. Entertainment Weekly described his first book, "Sleep Demons," as "a graceful hybrid of a book that's half research treatise and half memoir," and that applies as well to "Five Quarts," a breezy ride of a book that is disarmingly nonchalant about leaping around through history and returning, always, to tales of Hayes' sisters and his longtime partner, Steve. Not just any writer could make you care about a German scientist named Paul Ehrlich, who received the Nobel Prize in 1908 for his contributions to the development of immunology, which included developing what is now called chemotherapy. Hayes introduces Ehrlich into the narrative casually, mentioning that he coined the term "magic bullet," and then pans back to bring alive a more human picture of the man, leaning on a biography written by Ehrlich's former secretary Martha Marquardt. "In Marquardt's affectionate work as well as in the drier tomes of Ehrlich's fellow scientists, a telling quirk surfaces: The man loved colors," Hayes tells us. "He was 'emotionally swayed' by them, one gentleman wrote. What spring is to a parfumeur, colors were to Paul Ehrlich. Though always a busy, busy man, Marquardt revealed, the doctor would still stop to extol the roar of yellows and reds in a bouquet of flowers. They 'would make him quite ecstatic,' Marquardt admitted." If the book at times feels like an endless series of digressions, the kind of thing one might hear from a charmingly quirky stranger on the N-Judah, Hayes has a higher purpose in mind with his short attention span. He's like a grade-school teacher who tricks the students into learning, by making it fun, for example, to think about the different types of white blood cells and what they do. By never, ever getting too technical, or too solemn, and connecting ideas with people wherever possible, Hayes equips even a casual reader with the knowledge to gain new insights into life, our bodies and how science can make more advances in fighting disease, especially HIV. The devastating toll of the epidemic looms over the book, never far out of mind, but never dwelled on, either. Hayes tells of his many years of doctor visits side-by-side with his longtime companion Steve, who is HIV positive. But such descriptions have a casually informative quality to them, as if he was describing a visit to Alcatraz. That's not to say dark notes do not find their way into the book, only that Hayes never lets gloominess take over, even in describing the closing of Muscle System, a gym on Hayes Street that was much more than just a gym. "I had joined Muscle System right after arriving in the city," Hayes writes. "At the time, it was THE place to work out. It had such a mystique that Armistead Maupin wrote about it in his 'Tales of the City' series. Every beautiful man in San Francisco had a membership to this gym, it was said. Luckily, I later met one there: Steve, who'd moved here from Illinois in 1987. Muscle System functioned as the heart of the community, even though it was located a good mile from the Castro district." Like a body battling the virus, the gym had been worn down and steadily depleted. Each week, new notes were taped up at the front counter announcing yet another memorial service. The wide cast of colorful characters thinned and thinned, sometimes as if its members were merely vanishing into thin air. Finally, all that was left was a husk of the old place, empty lockers decorated with the "BE HERE FOR THE CURE" stickers that Hayes - and Steve - had put up years earlier. This happens to be the spot in the narrative where Hayes introduces Paul Ehrlich, and the timing is everything: Coming as a distraction from the ringing sense of loss summed up by the abandoned lockers at the once-hot gym, the longish section on Ehrlich comes as a relief. So do sections on Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, an inveterate tinkerer, born in the Netherlands in 1632, who designed his own small microscopes and glimpsed what he dubbed "little animals," bacteria and protozoans; Bram Stoker and the authors of other books exploring vampiric themes; and hemophilia and the royal families of Europe. Hayes' ultimate theme can be boiled down to a simple, reassuring thought: We are not alone. That is, mysterious new ailments have always cropped up throughout human history, and a few creative scientists have always been there to fill in the gaps in human knowledge necessary to win the fight against the disease. The only open question is how epic will be the human cost before the medical establishment can truly do that with HIV. • Steve Kettmann is the author of "One Day at Fenway: A Day in the Life of Baseball in America."
I think this is an excellent book, a perfect combination of what its subtitle promises: "a personal and natural history of blood." I was riveted by the stories in the book, from the author's own past to the Ancient Greek and Roman beliefs to the examination of AIDS research to the chapter on vampirism. It's very well-written with a unique voice, and it's as educational as it is entertaining. My only critique of this book is that I wish it were longer. I wish Hayes added more natural history without removing any of his personal stories. I wanted to know MORE about vampirism and bloodletting and hemophilia and ancient philosophies about blood and what it contains. But that's an odd critique because it means that Hayes did his job so well, he left me wanting more. Overall, I highly recommend this book. Just be prepared for the personal history, and don't criticize Hayes for including it since the subtitle guarantees as much!
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I loved some bits of it, but much of it didn't interest me. The personal memoir wasn't compelling enough to involve me and Hayes' "I'm too dumb to understand this sciencey talk, so it's okay if you don't either, reader" act was a little annoying. I did love everything vampire-related, though. And a lot of the historical anecdotes were fun, if rehash of common knowledge. I would definitely recommend this as a motivational and educational read for anyone whose life is touched by HIV. A lot of bonding going on.
—Elisa
Five Quarts by Bill Hayes, a Kindle book I began reading, oof, in early February. The reason the start date is really hazy is that I usually read this book before the start of ASL class, so, yay, school is distracting.The tone and mood of Five Quarts is what sparked and kept my attention throughout the entire book, particularily when it came to linking comic books and myth to biology and medical science. I completely have interest and concern for Bill and Steve and knowing their stories and those of the medicial professionals of this book has kindled a new interest in phlebotomy.
—Kristine
This was a pretty cool book. Admittedly, I picked it up expecting to learn the historical, cultural, and contemporary ins-and-outs of blood. However, it turned out to be fairly personal and rather literary. As I read more and more, I gained an appreciation from Hayes's perspective and personal experience with blood. I will mention that an equally important topic in this book seemed to be HIV, which I found to be thoughtfully commented on throughout. All-in-all, for something I hadn't expected, I really enjoyed this as a non-fictional story with a nice twist of history and parallels to mythology. Oh, and the research into blood, history, and contemporary science was very well done.
—Zach
