Thomas

As a non-financial background type person, i thought this was very enlightening, since i never think about concepts like these. While a little boring at times, overall, it opened my mind to a new way of conceptualizing what finance is all about. Also, the lessons of the book are really valuable: the regularity with which events like the current financial situation have recurred is a lesson to anyone who wants to invest or consider saving his/her own personal funds.

Interesting in places, pretty boring in others. This book is about the periodic table in the same way any story about anything related to science can be linked to the periodic table, since after all everything is made of elements.
so average, non-compelling work. Perhaps because the material is so iffy the narration feels long winded...

Great entertainment. One of those books you could just listen to straight through. Not sure how he did not get kicked off the team....but great that he did not. Really funny and will have you laughing to yourself and having others wonder what the heck you are listening to.


Really well read.

I expected a diatribe and that is what I got, but even the there are so many unsubstantiated opinions that leaves one asking why not back up your arguments better. One recollection I have is a sentence that the European ministers increased interest rates because of an unfounded fear of inflation. Well these are smart people too. Why were they fearful? What signals were they misreading?

Also fundamentally this whole book comes down to thinking that World War II is a model for everything, and how do we know that this applies today?

Finally the reading was waaaaaayyyyyy too slow and boring and drawn out.

for anyone interested in politics, history, or any aspect of modern society.

This is a great author. I have read “the Prize” at least 3 times and this is as good. It is a great overview of energy. What he has a unique gift for is letting the reader understand the primacy the quest for and acquisition of energy has on everything in our modern life. The book is thorough but fast paced and covers every aspect of energy and provides the reader with a comprehensive understanding of both the recent history of the search for and development of energy sources but also a comprehensive understanding of where we are headed. Its also very level headed…I did not get any “political” agenda. Just the facts. There is no “coal is awful, we need to develop all renewable sources” or “oil is wonderful and will last forever”, rather there is continuous crituqes of previously expounded opinions and the reader can draw his/her own conclusions.
Finally the reading is perfect..well paced, not boring, just a great experience.
I could not recommend more highly..a great great book I am sure I will listen to again.

Good book. I especially enjoyed the first half…this is the part of the history of physics that I would think peole are most familiar with…the development of the quantum theory from the late 1800s to early 1900s. At that point I was ready to give the book a 5, as it entertainingly weaves biographies of the key players with their contributions to physics in a very engaging way. Amazingly, every contributor except one (Schroedinger) made their biggest and most profound earth changing contributions when they were in their young 20s. Truly amazing history.

Unfortunately, the book takes a turn for the worse. The 3rd of the 4 quarters of the book I found boring..it is several hours of incredibly nuanced discussion of differences of opinion between Bohr and Einstein. While this may be of interest to a theoretical physicist, as a medical scientists with an MD PhD I could not follow this. The last quarter of the book picked up a little and put some things into broader perspective, but again by this time physics is so ethereal, mathematical, and without any way to conceptualize what is being described, that I found it difficulty to follow and understand. The denouement is good as it describes the fading into the background of all these great scientists.

On other thing that bugged me is that some stuff is completely over stated. For instance at one point the author claims that the most striking scientific discovery from 1964 is (I cannot remember the specifics now) a finding that validated Bohr’s quantum approach. I bet if you talked to anyone who is not a theoretical physicist, they would think that one of the other discoveries from the year which he lists as examples have had more impact on our lives.

just a great book, moving, poignant, well paced, well written, well performed. I would highly highly recommend this.

very well read.
a little long toward the end, but still: very powerful, factual and what can you say, i am not sure one could believe in the death penalty after reading examples like this. makes you wonder about the whole system. hope this is rare.

i am pretty liberal but this is typical one sided liberal viewpoint. It's like listening to a speech. I like that the author read it, but its pretty much the far left viewpoint without any attempt to provide a balanced opinion/view of the isues.

although not a long book, it's long for what is in here, which is a rehash of many of the same experiemnts that are in lots of other similar books. In addition, there is little helpful here....yes, children who can postpone eating a marshmellow do better than those who can't, and this may be even more important predictor than intelligence, but as a father of several young kids, the key question remains....WHY do some kids have better self control and is this inherited or a changeable/teachable trait. No answers there. And the author even contradicts himself at the end, stating that "urturing" is important at an early age but that later one needs to balance being demanding vs. nurturing. Well, yeah, that's pretty much why parenting is so hard in a nutshell.

narration is adequate.

As a non-oncology physician, I thought the book was well written, pretty engrossing, and a nice history of a disease and medicine's attempts to treat it. I find medical history fascinating so hearing about the original discoveries that led to some targetted therapeis and association studies linking smoking to lung cancer is amazing. The author is a very good story teller. As a clinical researcher, its nice to see in press balanced discussions about the impact of other strategies such as prevention on cancer. As a non-oncologist, however, it always amazes me how cancer grips people, even though there are many other diseases with even worse prognosis and impediments on life style.

However, i find that narration awful. I listened to flags of my fathers by this narrator, and his voice may have been appropriate for a book that is that maudulin, but this is painful. Every word is so syruppy and slow. It makes you sort of sick listening to him after a while.