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)

Entertaining Education

This was a very entertaining explanation of the history of science and our world. It is educational, without being boring or too basic.

I recommend it for the average reader who is not already well-informed about science, but that has some curiosity. Even as someone that knows something about physics, biology, and chemistry, I learned a few things.

Fascinating

I own the paperback book but struggled to get past chapter 5. if you're not a scientist the vocabulary can become overwhelming. Listening to the book was much more my speed!

This IS about absolutely everything

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I loved this book. It's humorous and informative. To the extent that you can cover the world and everything in it in one book, this is a fabulous success. This book will remain in my library, and I will listen to it multiple times.

Tremendous Book

Truly a worthwhile read. Bryson captures the splendid detail of almost everything worth mentioning that was ever discovered in the world.

Excellent book

This book is one of my all-time favorites. It's a must-listen-to which is funny, inciteful, and very interesting. I've listened to this book many times.

Can't get enough...

I've listened to this audio book at least 3 times and I'm working on the fourth now. So insightful and presented in a non-stuffy manner. Looking forward to other titles.

An around (and above and below) view of the world

What made the experience of listening to A Short History of Nearly Everything the most enjoyable?

I learned so much about all kinds of things and found it interesting--I don't think I would have enjoyed reading the book as much as I did listening

What was one of the most memorable moments of A Short History of Nearly Everything?

I really enjoyed hearing about all of the characters behind some of the great discoveries and what happened to them (and their discoveries)

What about Richard Matthews’s performance did you like?

Articulate and not overly dramatic

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Bryson's view of how we as human's are not the best protectors of our own world

Excellently written, well narrated, and clever

Another impossibly clever Bryson book and one of his best. While I would have preferred Bryson narrated the book himself, the reader was great none the less and still made a great presentation of Bryson's clever wit. An excellent, fun, and informative book.

A good-humored overview of planetary history

The author makes it clear at the beginning that he meant this book to be an easy-to-read introduction to our planet's history, meant for non-scientist readers, and I feel he succeeded quite well at this.

He explains our current understanding of the origins of our universe, our planet, and humanity. He also covers some of the previously-held ideas that have since been disproven, sometimes quite recently. Amusingly, he describes our current understandings as though they are the final truth, even though obviously we discover new things all the time, as demonstrated by his own text! For example tectonic plate theory was only just recently accepted by the scientific establishment, and we have discovered new things about black holes and other cosmic concepts in the nine years since the book was published.

All in all though he provides a very thorough and thoughtful overview of what we know and how we got to know it, and he encourages a scientific curiosity and wonder which will help people appreciate the ongoing process of learning about the world around us.

The narrator also does a very good job, keeping his tone humorous and engaging even while some of the text might seem too "dry" for some readers.

AWESOME

the book was awesome, learned a lot of information, and very well-read recommended for all however there are some lengthy descriptions that you will never remember a lot to take in