BETRAYED BY NATURE

Informative, optimistic tour of the science of cancer.

Hesketh (Biochemistry/Cambridge Univ.), familiar to lay audiences from BBC radio and TV, opens Part 1 with a capsule history of cancer, ranging from papyrus records of ancient Egypt to the scientific breakthroughs of the 21st century. He follows with a look at the distribution of different types of cancers around the world and what the data suggests about cancer's causes. Matters get technical in Part 2, but the author assumes little previous knowledge on the part of readers; he takes time to explain DNA, RNA, genes, chromosomes and how some genes mutate into cancer genes. In Part 3 he tackles cancer cells and the behavior of tumors. Throughout Parts 2 and 3, relatively simple diagrams and some black-and-white photographs help to clarify the technical discussions. For most readers, the final section—"Where Are We? Where Are We Going?”—will be of greatest interest. Here Hesketh explains how genome sequencing has begun to change how cancers are diagnosed and classified, and the promise this holds for therapy. We are at the beginning, he writes, of the era of personalized medicine, which holds the promise that we will someday be able to detect the threat of cancer long before it manifests itself by sequencing an individual's genome and using that information to design an individualized therapeutic strategy. The back matter includes a helpful glossary and two delightful odes to cancer, one written in 1964 by the noted geneticist (and cancer patient) J.B.S. Haldane and the other a modern version by Hesketh. Despite the author’s occasionally breezy style—“cancer is jolly complicated”—this is not a book to breeze through, but rather a solid account of how cancer works, how it has been combated and what the future holds for its treatment.