Book info

• Title A Short History of Nearly Everything
• Author Bill Bryson
• Year 2003
• Genre Non-fiction

Bill Bryson describes himself as a reluctant traveller, but even when he stays safely at home he can't contain his curiosity about the world around him. A Short History of Nearly Everything is his quest to understand everything that has happened from the Big Bang to the rise of civilization - how we got from there, being nothing at all, to here, being us. Bill Bryson's challenge is to take subjects that normally bore the pants off most of us, like geology, chemistry and particle physics, and see if there isn't some way to render them comprehensible to people who have never thought they could be interested in science. As a result, A Short History of Nearly Everything reveals the world in a way most of us have never seen it before.

Thoughts

423 pages brimming with facts and information, enough to make your head explode. Basically detailing the rise of the planet, from the nothingness of space, to the full of life, human-dwelling orb that it is today.

There are a lot of people throughout history detailed in this book but my favourite are the crazy scientists, one who likes to taste a little of each chemical he experiments with and is so found dead at his desk. Another, who discovered something immensely important to the world as we know it, and then kept it secret for a decade.

It’s written in a very people friendly way, each sentence is understandable and fun to read. But after about six chapters, your brain is spinning with facts and details. Not good bedtime reading.

I think the first half, about the planet forming and what makes it what it is today is slightly more interesting than how the humans took over the planet, but all in all - a majorly important book.

Rating: 5 / 5