Sunset Boulevard, 1963, and Dr Oliver Sacks is riding his motorcycle along peacefully when a car swerves at him. He thinks it must be a mistake by a drunken driver. But then, a bit further along, the car tries to sideswipe him again. What to do?

Sacks was raised in a north London family that had a remarkable lack of imagination when it came to selecting careers: his father was a doctor, his mother was a doctor, his older brother was a doctor, his uncle was a doctor, and three first cousins were doctors. He was a shy soul, awkward during his undergraduate years at Oxford. When, aged twenty-two, he went to Amsterdam to try to lose his virginity, he got so drunk in a bar that he fell unconscious in the