Deemed a "poet laureate of contemporary medicine" and "one of the great clinical writers of the 20th century" by the New York Times, neurologist and science historian Oliver Sacks was (and remains) one of our favorite authors. He brought true literary style to his explorations of the human brain, finding insight in the anomalies and so-called disabilities he encountered in his patients—including himself.

Hailed as a medical classic—winner of the Hawthornden Prize, and the inspiration for the film of the same name starring Robin Williams and Robert De Niro—this breakthrough account from 1973 follows 20 patients who had been rendered catatonic for decades by the sleeping-sickness epidemic of the 1920s. They had spent 40 years in hospital—motionless and speechless, aware of the world around them but unable to interact with it—until Sacks administered the then-new drug L-DOPA, which caused them to temporarily awake from their slumber.