*As heard on BBC Radio 4 Woman's Hour*
*A Blackwell's and Waterstones Best Popular Science Book of 2022*

'Excellent ... one of those rare pop-science books that make you look at the whole world differently' The Daily Telegraph *****
'Riveting' Mail on Sunday *****
'Captivating' Guardian, Book of the Day
'Compelling' Observer

Sarah Chaney takes us on an eye-opening and surprising journey into the history of science, revisiting the studies, landmark experiments and tests that proliferated from the early 19th century to find answers to the question: what's normal? These include a census of hallucinations - and even a UK beauty map (which claimed the women in Aberdeen were "the most repellent"). On the way she exposes many of the hangovers that are still with us from these dubious endeavours, from IQ tests to the BMI.

Interrogating how the notion and science of standardisation has shaped us all, as individuals and as a society, this book challenges why we ever thought that normal might be a desirable thing to be.

Sarah Chaney

A deep dive into the strange science of the 'Normal', and the roots of an anxiety-ridden modern obsession

Before the nineteenth century, the term normal was rarely ever associated with human behaviour. Normal was a term used in maths, for right angles. People weren't normal; triangles were.

But from the 1830s, this branch of science really took off across Europe and North America, with a proliferation of IQ tests, sex studies, a census of hallucinations - even a UK beauty map (which concluded the women in Aberdeen were "the most repellent"). This book tells the surprising history how the very notion of the normal came about, how it shaped us all, often while entrenching oppressive values.

Sarah Chaney looks at why we're still asking the internet: Do I have a normal body? Is my sex life normal? Are my kids normal? And along the way, she challenges why we ever thought it might be a desirable thing to be.