Hybrid Humans: Dispatches from the Frontiers of Man and Machine

Description

From the critically-acclaimed author of Anatomy of a Soldier Harry Parker's life changed overnight, when he lost his legs to an IED in Afghanistan. Here he takes us on a journey through the exhilarating landscape of a very human kind of hacking, meeting those pushing the limits of our bodies and brains - and grappling with his own new identity and disability along the way. What happens when our lives become enmeshed with technology? Most of us are 'coupled' 24/7 to our mobile phones, reliant on glasses, or pacemakers - but we are living in an era of dizzying new possibilities. Parker meets the soldiers having cutting-edge osseointegration, the first DIY cyborgs and biohackers tinkering in garages, and the scientists and surgeons pioneering the latest robotics and implants. He traces how they might lead us to powerful, liberating new possibilities for what a body can be - and how to be human is to be hybrid.

Harry Parker is the author of Anatomy of a Soldier (2016), translated in eight languages. He grew up in Wiltshire, and was educated at Falmouth College of Art and University College London. He joined the British Army when he was 23 and served in Iraq in 2007 and Afghanistan in 2009 as a Captain. He is now a writer and artist and lives in London.

'Praise for Anatomy of a Soldier: 'Marvellously told'' - Alan Bennett 'Alive to every nuance of feeling' - Hilary Mantel 'A brilliant book' - Edna O'Brien 'Beautifully constructed and moving' - Val McDermid 'A tour de force' - Nadeem Aslam