I don't know if you have had the experience of moving to a new city. Have you? You study street maps, and you have to get lost several times. But somewhere along the line you start having moments where things are snapping into focus. You start to see how things fit together in your head. Soon you are imagining short-cuts, anticipating the traffic jams, and debating the best routes with the natives.

I had to struggle with this atlas a little. I'm more a psych guy than a neuro guy but I love the circuitry and appreciate the importance of understanding it. I liked this initially because of the great illustrations of brain sections, but soon I found that things were clicking into place in my mind.

I recommend this for anyone struggling to understand all the tracts and nuclei in the spinal cord and brain stem. There is a sequence of slices in the middle section of this atlas that creeps up slowly, from lumbar spine through the thalamus, with a picture of an actual stained section next to a labelled illustration. I went through this slowly and carefully, copying the pictures as I went. And then, BOOM, I had that moment. I could see it all, motor tracts, sensory tracts, cerebellar circuits, ventricles, even the friggin' reticular activating system. It was quite an expansive feeling.

Again, not a flawless book. I still like to go back to Netter's to see the limbic structures and basal ganglia dissections as well as to review the vasculature. But Haines' Atlas does have some unique strengths if you are willing to work through it very patiently. Enjoy.

Peace, I'm out.