On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters

On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters - Hardcover

$29.00
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On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters
  • On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters
On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters - Hardcover

On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters - Hardcover

by Bonnie Tsui
$29.00
$29.00

Book Overview

From the bestselling author of Why We Swim comes a mind-expanding exploration of muscle that will change the way you think about what moves us through the world.

"Remarkable ... A singular book about the true meanings of strength and flexibility, about our ability to define who we are and who we might be."
--Ed Yong, New York Times bestselling author of An Immense World and I Contain Multitudes

In On Muscle, Bonnie Tsui brings her signature blend of science, culture, immersive reporting, and personal narrative to examine not just what muscles are but what they mean to us. Cardiac, smooth, skeletal--these three different types of muscle in our bodies make our hearts beat; push food through our intestines, blood through our vessels, babies out the uterus; attach to our bones and allow for motion. Tsui also traces how muscles have defined beauty--and how they have distorted it--through the ages, and how they play an essential role in our physical and mental health.

Tsui introduces us to the first female weightlifter to pick up the famed Scottish Dinnie Stones, then takes us on a 50-mile run through the Nevada desert that follows the path of escape from a Native boarding school--and gives the concept of endurance new meaning. She travels to Oslo, where cutting-edge research reveals how muscles help us bounce back after injury and illness, an important aspect of longevity. She jumps into the action with a historic Double Dutch club in Washington, D.C., to explain anew what Charles Darwin meant by the brain-body connection. Woven throughout are stories of Tsui's childhood with her Chinese immigrant artist dad--a black belt in karate--who schools her from a young age in a kind of quirky, in-house Muscle Academy.

On Muscle shows us the poetry in the physical, and the surprising ways muscle can reveal what we're capable of.
ISBN9781643753089
Author Bonnie Tsui
PublisherAlgonquin Books
GenreEducation and Sports
FormatHardcover
PublishedApril 2025
LanguageENG- English
Pages256
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Body, Mind & Spirit Nonfiction Science Sports & Recreation

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More by Bonnie Tsui

On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters

On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters - Hardcover

On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters - Hardcover

By Bonnie Tsui

About Bonnie Tsui

Bonnie Tsui lives, swims, and surfs in the Bay Area. A longtime contributor to the New York Times and California Sunday Magazine, she has been the recipient of the Jane Rainie Opel Young Alumna Award from Harvard University, the Lowell Thomas Gold Award, and a National Press Foundation Fellowship. Her last book, American Chinatown: A People's History of Five Neighborhoods, won the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature and was a San Francisco Chronicle bestseller and Best of 2009 Notable Bay Area Books selection. Her website is bonnietsui.com.

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