The Body's Edge: Our Cultural Obsession With Skin

Our skin covers us in a mantle no thicker than this line of type, separating us from the outside by the thinnest of margins. It is the real and symbolic boundary between ourselves and the external world. It is there, at the body's edge, that some of the most interesting stories about human biology, mythology, medicine, and health are told, and Marc Lappe, author of several highly acclaimed science books, is the right person to tell them.

He discusses how the "newly discovered" permeability of the skin, long recognized by other cultures, has lead to the use of drug-bearing patches; how potentially harmful chemicals penetrate the skin; how vulnerable we are to particular environmental insults; and much more. For the first time, he tells the inside story of silicone injections, an ill-fated experiment of the 1960s and 1970s.

The Body's Edge is a provocative examination of how we can reinforce what the skin provides and maintain our edge against an increasingly hostile world.