A Short History of Nearly Everything

By: Bill Bryson

Narrated by: Richard Matthews

Length: 18 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's summary

One of the world’s most beloved and best-selling 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.

©2003 Bill Bryson (P)2003 Books on Tape, Inc. Published by Arrangement with Random House Audio Publishing Group, A Division of Random House, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Not to be missed." (AudioFile)
"Destined to become a modern classic of science writing." (The New York Times Book Review)

it's pretty good when taken into account its age

The book is good overall does have some outdated information but it's a history book so for the time it was written I'm sure it was accurate!

This should be without a doubt required reading

Rare combination of being highly informative and written in entetaining way. Definitely can recommend to anyone regardless if you are normally interested in science or not.

Outstanding

This should be required reading for every person on earth!

I learned more froM this than my years in grade school, middle school and high school.

I really enjoyed the narration as well

Sometimes the names were hard to follow, but this is exceptionally written.

Best book on science ever!

If you want to understand the sciences in general, this book provides a clear, entertaining and enlightening experience. It should be required reading for all junior high students! It provides a strong foundation for the scientific method and insight into how science will either destroy or save the world.

What you don't know or forget

Thia was an audio book for me, recommended due to the vocabulary, terms, concepts, and names referenced throughout. You quickly realize how much you forget from your school days and how much there is to know. Finally, it reinforces (for me) how the hard sciences are under-appreciated in school as careers and for what they accomplish.

Great writing makes everything interesting!

Should be required for everyone! loved it! Very technical but also funny and insightful and reminds me of every great teacher I ever had. They tell the story so well, you can't wait to find out more!

Amazing book

it worth reading for sure, or to refresh geology, anthropology, evolution from college or hear it for the first time more.

Fascinating through and through

Superb writing. Superb narration.
A broad survey of everything humankind knows, believes it knows and doesn’t know about the universe; encompassing most of the natural sciences: cosmology, astronomy, geology, climatology, zoology, biology, and more. Because of its scope, it cannot go too deep on every single topic, however the amount of information is more than adequate for an initial grasp of the different realms of human knowledge. The writing is straightforward, with good tempo, always intriguing and with a lot of wit and downright funny moments. The narrator does a good job at keeping things lively and delivering puns while remaining composed in a very enjoyable manner.
Written in 2003, some of the material could use updates (if nothing else because one wants to get closure on some of the open questions), but I reckon that most points (if not all), remain valid to date.
One of my favorite books ever.

Need to know

You will enjoy a tremendous amount of pertinent scientific information easily and entertainingly with little effort.

The narrator is talented and makes the experience better.

Fantastic.

My attention was %100 captivated. Narrator was perfect and as it says, covers nearly everything. Loved it.