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Product Description: 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 Everything is 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. Amazon.com: 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: Rating: 
Date: 2008-07-07
I Heart Science!!
No, actually I don't. In fact, you couldn't have coerced me into any science classes in college without brute force. But I was inexplicably drawn to this book by Bryson's witty writing and ability to help me comprehend the once thought-to-be 'impossible to understand' topics that are covered in depth is phenomenal. I was chuckling throughout this entire book. Science is fun with Bill Bryson and this book is simply amazing!! Who would have thought that chemistry could be such a page turner and that people like Rev. William Buckhead and Clair Patterson could be such interesting individuals? Rating:
Date: 2008-07-01
Surprisingly useful
It seems kindof cheesy at first, and Bryson's writing style can be a little precious. (Although always easy to read, and I certainly never felt bogged down in this book; in fact, I finished the whole thing in a weekend.) But I read it toward the beginning of a long kick to learn about stuff, and as I've gotten more in depth in several fields, I find myself remembering things I read in this book. He's given me a firmer foundation in...well, nearly everything...than I realized.
Many of you people know a lot of things, and for you this may be unnecessary. But some of you may be like me: high school chemistry is a distant memory, and you're not sure if you've ever even had a history course, and suddenly you sortof wish you knew all those things school was supposed to teach you. If that describes you, this book is a remarkably good place to start. Rating:
Date: 2008-06-28
A Resource for Us All
This is not a book to be devoured, or scanned lightly, though Mr. Bryson's fluid prose and wit would allow us to do so. This is a work to be pulled from the shelf more frequently than not and re-examined like a long Del Prado wall. It possesses the richness of a Qalicheh carpet or a Benares silk--an item to be held with awe. What an amazing compilation and composition. Rating: 
Date: 2008-06-27
Entertaining
The book was an entertaining read. It briefly touches on just about every subject. The only real thing that isn't that great is that it will go through several historical figures very quickly leaving you with a lot of information to digest. Later, the author often returns to talk about that figure, but after you've already forgotten about him. Not a big deal though.
Also, I thought the book would be more focused around history but it is actually more focused around the history of science. Rating:
Date: 2008-06-22
I Just had fun
I dont know much about Sci. but just had a good time reading this book/ |
