One of the world's most beloved and bestselling writers takes his ultimate journey -- into the most intriguing and intractable questions that science seeks to answer. In A Walk in the Woods, Bill Bryson trekked the Appalachian Trail -- well, most of it. In In A Sunburned Country, he confronted some of the most lethal wildlife Australia has to offer. Now, in his biggest book, he confronts his greatest challenge: to understand -- and, if possible, answer -- the oldest, biggest questions we have posed about the universe and ourselves. Taking as territory everything from the Big Bang to the rise of civilization, Bryson seeks to understand how we got from there being nothing at all to there being us. To that end, he has attached himself to a host of the world's most advanced (and often obsessed) archaeologists, anthropologists, and mathematicians, travelling to their offices, laboratories, and field camps. He has read (or tried to read) their books, pestered them with questions, apprenticed himself to their powerful minds. A Short History of Nearly Everythingis the record of this quest, and it is a sometimes profound, sometimes funny, and always supremely clear and entertaining adventure in the realms of human knowledge, as only Bill Bryson can render it. Science has never been more involving or entertaining. From the Hardcover edition.
From primordial nothingness to this very moment, A Short History of Nearly Everything reports what happened and how humans figured it out. To accomplish this daunting literary task, Bill Bryson uses hundreds of sources, from popular science books to interviews with luminaries in various fields. His aim is to help people like him, who rejected stale school textbooks and dry explanations, to appreciate how we have used science to understand the smallest particles and the unimaginably vast expanses of space. With his distinctive prose style and wit, Bryson succeeds admirably. Though A Short History clocks in at a daunting 500-plus pages and covers the same material as every science book before it, it reads something like a particularly detailed novel (albeit without a plot). Each longish chapter is devoted to a topic like the age of our planet or how cells work, and these chapters are grouped into larger sections such as "The Size of the Earth" and "Life Itself." Bryson chats with experts like Richard Fortey (author of Life and Trilobite) and these interviews are charming. But it's when Bryson dives into some of science's best and most embarrassing fights--Cope vs. Marsh, Conway Morris vs. Gould--that he finds literary gold. --Therese Littleton
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.5 / 5.0
Well almost everything:
This book presented an account of history of science in 18th, 19th and 20th century. It made science interesting with stories of scientists and their rivalry. Hmmm almost like a soap opera.
The book also brings out the complexity of life and tries to define the same through simplicity of atoms. It almost succeeded in explaining origin of life. Its a great book.
Now, what got left out. It concentrated too much on western scientists of 18th to 20th century. It does not give any space to ancient... more info
A Must Read for Everyone:
I purchased "A Short History of Nearly Everything" because of the glowing report of two friends who had read the book. This is a delightfully put together account of "nearly everything". If you are looking to know more about lots of things, this is your book.
A tour through history:
Fabulous, well written book that covers a wide variety of little known or understood topics. Bryson meanders through some of the most interesting parts of our history with his special gifts of quirky insights and stylish prose. This is the book that will have you saying "Wow, I didn't know that. That's really interesting!"
A biography of the universe:
The most amazing thing about this book is that it manages to live up to its title! Bryson covers a whopping amount of material in just under 600 pages - discussing everything from the expanse of the universe to the confines of a single cell. And he does a more than admirable job. Scientific technicalities are presented in a highly readable manner through the smart use of analogies. His chapter on the solar system, for example, left me with an infinitely more vivid picture of the make-up of our planetary... more info
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