Overview

When journalist Dennis Cass was nineteen years old his stepfather, Bill, suffered from a psychotic break. Cass tried to commit him to a mental institution only to watch Bill escape from a cab en route to a Harlem hospital and run raving down the streets of Manhattan. Some fifteen years later, a bout of writer's block turned Cass's thoughts toward the brain. A complete stranger to science, Cass immersed himself in the world of neuroscience, subjecting himself to brain scans, psychological tests, and scientific conferences, as he attempted to gain a better understanding of ADHD, anxiety, stress, motivation and reward, and consciousness. Then things got a little weird. What began as a more clinical effort to understand himself soon became a personal and emotional journey into the fragile, mysterious workings of the mind and the self. Head Case is a charming, hilarious, and at times harrowing memoir of scientific experimentation. It's a story of science and society, of fathers and sons, and of how the past lives on in the present. Along the way the book asks timeless questions: What do we know about ourselves What can we know about ourselves And how much self-knowledge can a single person handle

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9780060594732

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Reviews

[A] fast-reading story with educational tidbits snuck in....Mr. Cass relates his ideas in a breezy, conversational style...a fun and informative read. --Washington Times Armchair quarterbacks had George Plimpton's Paper Lion, wannabe bikers had Hunter S. Thompson's Hell's Angels, and now anyone curious about their own brain has Dennis Cass' Head Case, a compulsively readable and witty account of his quest to understand what makes him--and us--tick. Neuroscience has never been examined in quite this way, and it's certainly never been so funny. --Adelaide Advertiser Dennis Cass ventures into the terra infirma that is neuroscience, and returns with a fascinating, funny and touching tale. I recommend it for anyone who owns a brain. --New York

Dennis Cass ventures into the terra infirma that is neuroscience, and returns with a fascinating, funny and touching tale. I recommend it for anyone who owns a brain. -- New York Armchair quarterbacks had George Plimpton's Paper Lion, wannabe bikers had Hunter S. Thompson's Hell's Angels, and now anyone curious about their own brain has Dennis Cass' Head Case, a compulsively readable and witty account of his quest to understand what makes him--and us--tick. Neuroscience has never been examined in quite this way, and it's certainly never been so funny. -- Adelaide Advertiser [A] fast-reading story with educational tidbits snuck in....Mr. Cass relates his ideas in a breezy, conversational style...a fun and informative read. -- Washington Times

""Dennis Cass ventures into the terra infirma that is neuroscience, and returns with a fascinating, funny and touching tale. I recommend it for anyone who owns a brain."" -- New York ""Armchair quarterbacks had George Plimpton's Paper Lion, wannabe bikers had Hunter S. Thompson's Hell's Angels, and now anyone curious about their own brain has Dennis Cass' Head Case, a compulsively readable and witty account of his quest to understand what makes him--and us--tick. Neuroscience has never been examined in quite this way, and it's certainly never been so funny."" -- Adelaide Advertiser ""[A] fast-reading story with educational tidbits snuck in....Mr. Cass relates his ideas in a breezy, conversational style...a fun and informative read."" -- Washington Times

Author Information

Dennis Cass has been a journalist for ten years, writing for Harper's, Spin, Mother Jones, and Slate.com. He lives in Minneapolis with his wife and son.

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