One of the most interesting books I have ever read! I went into this book being like a normal person and taking smell for granted, it’s always been there and done it’s job, recognising food that has gone off, detecting smoke when in danger and getting me in trouble as being the victim of “whoever smelt it, dealt it”. Whilst my hearing is a bit rubbish and my eyesight is awful, I have never really lost my ability to smell, the odd moment during a cold but usually too ill to care about that. This book has really opened my eyes (and nose) to what people are going through when they can no longer smell, they lose part of the world around them and until COVID came along are never taken seriously…and when the smells come back it always isn’t good news, for some they get one smell and often it is a nasty one…imagine everything smelling and tasting of sewage, my brain just cannot process this.

The layout of this book is great, you get the history of olfaction, the present day situation and how COVID changed things and then the future, ways to get the smell-ability back. Mixed in with all this is the scientists, the work they have done and the incredible things they have discovered and throughout the book Totaro shares with us first hand experience as anosmia kicks in, the way it affected her life and mental health and how she worked hard to get it all working again. The science is fascinating and Totaro writes in a way that makes it easy to follow, some words are rather technical but do not take anything away from the reading experience. I also like the fact that Totaro explores further, looking at things like art and language and I have noticed whilst writing this review that I get red squiggly lines under anosmia and olfaction both are words Microsoft refuse to accept.

One sign that shows how good this book is, is that I have had loads of conversations with friends about what I’ve learnt…most conversations were about what I learnt about nipples….and it has also made me thing about my life. I remember as a little kid being forced to eat weetabix because my parents considered it healthy, the stuff is right mank and I hated it, I soon learnt that if I held my nose I was able to eat it, I guess that classes me as a child scientist. One more point of interest that caused a big discussion at work was the chapter about how our wonderful and very very capable government handled the pandemic and that it took them far longer to acknowledge that the lack of smell and taste was a symptom, none of us were aware of this delay…crazy.

This is a cracking book that I can’t recommend enough, I have learnt a huge amount from this and have a new appreciation for my 5th sense.

Blog review: felcherman.wordpress.com/2022/08/19/on-the-scent-by-paola-totaro-robert-wainwright/