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Zero at the Bone: Rewriting Life after a Snakebite
Late one evening in the summer of 2003, Erec Toso arrived home to his wife and children after an ordinary day at his university office. In the darkness of his yard, a rattlesnake lay along the path, basking in the post-monsoon coolness. Toso, lost in thought, never saw the snake, which struck him on the foot and injected a huge dose of venom.
Zero at the Bone is a deeply personal narrative about Toso’s physical recovery and emotional transformation following this near-death experience. In elegant prose that inspires as much as it unsettles, Toso takes the reader along with him on his expedition into the uncharted territory of cellular damage, hallucination, and ultimately profound spiritual awakening. On all levels, it is a book about pain. Toso spares no detail in his accounts of agonizing hospital procedures, in his revelations about rattlesnake lore, or in his descriptions of the wide-ranging effects of snake venom. But quickly the reader realizes that the physical pain of the snakebite is only the more tangible marker of the psychological pain and turmoil that Toso endures in the emotional journey that ensues.
In the months that follow his terrifying attack, priorities, daily habits, family relations, and definitions of self all come into question. What is predictable becomes problematic; what is comfortable becomes disconcerting. In a story that hinges on a common fear about an unlikely event—that of a snakebite—Toso uncovers a more widespread reality that many of us do not fear enough—complacency.
Zero at the Bone is a deeply personal narrative about Toso’s physical recovery and emotional transformation following this near-death experience. In elegant prose that inspires as much as it unsettles, Toso takes the reader along with him on his expedition into the uncharted territory of cellular damage, hallucination, and ultimately profound spiritual awakening. On all levels, it is a book about pain. Toso spares no detail in his accounts of agonizing hospital procedures, in his revelations about rattlesnake lore, or in his descriptions of the wide-ranging effects of snake venom. But quickly the reader realizes that the physical pain of the snakebite is only the more tangible marker of the psychological pain and turmoil that Toso endures in the emotional journey that ensues.
In the months that follow his terrifying attack, priorities, daily habits, family relations, and definitions of self all come into question. What is predictable becomes problematic; what is comfortable becomes disconcerting. In a story that hinges on a common fear about an unlikely event—that of a snakebite—Toso uncovers a more widespread reality that many of us do not fear enough—complacency.
224 pages, Paperback
First published April 19, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 18, 2009
Not everything in this book interested me or impressed me as much as Toso's frequent Abbeyesque description and veneration of the desert around Tucson. This isn't an easy book to plow through because the writing definitely sounds like an English professor's--just a little too "crafted." Yet, in his inscription to the book, Toso wrote that he hoped his pages would evoke images of the low desert for me, and it does serve that purpose. I really like that a man who suffered a severe rattlesnake bite, which jeopardized his ability to ever run through the desert again, blames not the snake but shortsighted humans encroaching on the snakes' habitat. As it should be.
Toso seems completely captivated by rattlesnakes and, in a way, loves them even though one almost took his life. By describing the wonders of the rattlesnake, he, in essence, suggests how lowly we humans are by comparison:
"The life and perceptive capacity of the rattlesnake is about as different from ours as a life can be. They have an organ, called Jacobson's organ, that interprets microscopic particles picked up by the tongue; it is thousands of times more sensitive than the human tongue. A rattlesnake is acutely sensitive to sound, scent, heat, and image. In the sensory deprivation that is the desert, they find rich trails of stimuli, and have evolved to read the slightest signals. They are literate to the signs we can't even detect.
"By contrast, we are hugely untutored in the ways of reading the desert. We miss most of what is there. We see emptiness, hear silence, smell only the most pungent of scents. Snakes live by being able to detect the footfall of a mouse and the molecular scent trails of prey and other snakes in the breeding season. And by avoiding the clumsiness of people.
"They are, in other words, much more sensitive than we, infinitely more tuned in to their surroundings. Yet we see them as cold and unfeeling. We also see them as vicious, hostile, always on the make. We think they are like us."
The one thing I really dislike or didn't get about this book is how, near the end, Toso once again describes in great detail how humans continue to develop the desert and push wild animals out, to individual death and then mass extinction. He refers to finding a second rattlesnake in his yard and calling the fire department to collect it, and he admits that the snake will likely not live in its new habitat. He understands all this; in fact, he's acutely aware of it as he travels through the desert and witnesses it happening around him. But in the end he has found peace with himself and the desert. It enrages me, yet he continues to live amongst it. In the end, I found the book just too egocentric.
Toso seems completely captivated by rattlesnakes and, in a way, loves them even though one almost took his life. By describing the wonders of the rattlesnake, he, in essence, suggests how lowly we humans are by comparison:
"The life and perceptive capacity of the rattlesnake is about as different from ours as a life can be. They have an organ, called Jacobson's organ, that interprets microscopic particles picked up by the tongue; it is thousands of times more sensitive than the human tongue. A rattlesnake is acutely sensitive to sound, scent, heat, and image. In the sensory deprivation that is the desert, they find rich trails of stimuli, and have evolved to read the slightest signals. They are literate to the signs we can't even detect.
"By contrast, we are hugely untutored in the ways of reading the desert. We miss most of what is there. We see emptiness, hear silence, smell only the most pungent of scents. Snakes live by being able to detect the footfall of a mouse and the molecular scent trails of prey and other snakes in the breeding season. And by avoiding the clumsiness of people.
"They are, in other words, much more sensitive than we, infinitely more tuned in to their surroundings. Yet we see them as cold and unfeeling. We also see them as vicious, hostile, always on the make. We think they are like us."
The one thing I really dislike or didn't get about this book is how, near the end, Toso once again describes in great detail how humans continue to develop the desert and push wild animals out, to individual death and then mass extinction. He refers to finding a second rattlesnake in his yard and calling the fire department to collect it, and he admits that the snake will likely not live in its new habitat. He understands all this; in fact, he's acutely aware of it as he travels through the desert and witnesses it happening around him. But in the end he has found peace with himself and the desert. It enrages me, yet he continues to live amongst it. In the end, I found the book just too egocentric.
Want to Read
April 22, 2008my comp professor's book about his life-changing experience.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews