Anna (Literannie)'s Reviews > The Puzzle Solver: A Scientist's Desperate Quest to Cure the Illness that Stole His Son

27-year-old adventurer and photographer Whitney Dafoe is now bedridden with a mysterious illness that causes such fatigue that he can barely communicate most days. Once believed to be a purely psychological problem, Whitney has been diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and through the work of his father, a highly-honored geneticist, is now beginning to be believed to have a biological disease.

This book leaned more towards being a biography and less towards an being in-depth science investigation which I liked. Even though written from an outsider’s perspective, I left feeling like I knew each member of the family and was a part of their journey, even for just a little while. I knew very little of this disease going in and this book left me wanting to learn other’s stories as well as to have more of an understanding why this was dismissed for so long within the medical community. Although short, I did feel there were some details used as fillers to make this long enough to be a book but I appreciated the overall story it told.

I recommend this to fellow fans of character-driven novels who want to dip their toes into nonfiction and anyone interested in medical science.

Thank you to the publisher for the gifted copy in exchange for an honest review.