What's Gotten into You

The Story of Your Body's Atoms, from the Big Bang Through Last Night's Dinner

De: Dan Levitt

Narrado por: Mike Chamberlain

For listeners of Bill Bryson, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Siddhartha Mukherjee, a wondrous, wildly ambitious, and vastly entertaining work of popular science that tells the awe-inspiring story of the elements that make up the human body, and how these building blocks of life travelled billions of miles and across billions of years to make us who we are.

Every one of us contains a billion times more atoms than all the grains of sand in the earth’s deserts. If you weigh 150 pounds, you’ve got enough carbon to make 25 pounds of charcoal, enough salt to fill a saltshaker, enough chlorine to disinfect several backyard swimming pools, and enough iron to forge a 3-inch nail. But how did these elements combine to make us human?

All matter—everything around us and within us—has an ultimate birthday: the day the universe was born. This informative, eye-opening, and eminently enjoyable book is the story of our atoms’ long strange journey from the Big Bang to the creation of stars, through the assembly of Planet Earth, and the formation of life as we know it. It’s also the story of the scientists who made groundbreaking discoveries and unearthed extraordinary insights into the composition of life. Behind their unexpected findings were investigations marked by fierce rivalries, obsession, heartbreak, flashes of insight, and flukes of blind luck. Ultimately they’ve helped us understand the mystery of our existence: how a quadrillion atoms made of particles from the Big Bang now animate each of our cells.

Shaped by the curious mind and bold vision of science and history documentarian Dan Levitt, this wondrous book is no less than the story of life itself.

Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2023 Dan Levitt (P)2023 HarperCollins Publishers

Great stuff

Lots of great information written in a very accessible fashion. This was a very easy listen and I came away feeling smarter.

As engrossing as a novel

Beautifully written. The way Levitt tells the history of each discovery as a story of human trial and error is as engaging as a novel. It's got everything from physics to academic politics to hot-air balloons, all of which helped (or hindered) our understanding of what goes on inside our own bodies. I'm reading it again and enjoying it just as much the second time.

This book really deserves a title like, “The greatest story ever told”

Dan Levitt is a master storyteller weaving so many informative bits together so well. This book beautifully ties Physics (how atoms were created) chemistry (how atoms combine to make molecules and processes that make for complexity of life functions), and biology (cells, viruses, and evolution of life) together. It uses history - to tell stories capable of being consumed as stand-alone articles. Each one offers deeper understanding of facts that, in current teaching regimens end up as under appreciated in their magnitude at the hands of well-meaning but ineffective curricula filled with meaningless tidbits that students are required to memorize. This book does the opposite; it piques curiosity which in turn promotes enduring understanding.

Levitt has managed to synthesize such a beautiful story. He’s filled it with so much information that any student could use as a jump-off point for deeper investigation.

I appreciate Dan Levitt’s passion, humanity and brilliance. We are all better for his contribution to understanding who we, as a species are and where we came from. He is a world citizen of the first order

<i>What’s gotten into you”</i> is a collection of the greatest scientific discoveries regarding how humans came to be. I’m in awe of this story. It is something I hoped to write some day. I’ll be re-reading this for years to come.

Despite the title’s catchy play on a phrase, this book really deserves a title like, “The greatest story ever told.” Alas, others have already beat Levitt to it.

Fascinating story told in understandable way

Dan Levitt tells the fascinating story of our evolution from the Big Bang to the limits of our current understanding. He tells the story and history of life on earth to how our bodies work. He explains the science simply without making one feel like he dumbed it down. He leads us through important discovers across the ages and introduces us to the important scientists who contributed to the body of knowledge about life. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and recommend it to anyone with a desire to delve into the subject beyond what they learned in high school science.

Interestingly Educational

This book jams in a bunch of facts from different disciplines of science. Perhaps as an adult I find these topics more interesting, regardless, the book was very entertaining and revealed a lot of incomplete facts presented in schools or popular culture.

Science for non-specialist readers--fascinating!

This is a great book, the type you don't want to put down (or pause--in the case of an audiobook). It tells the story of how scientists explored and created new explanations regarding the composition and processes of creation of the universe of which our bodies are a microcosm, underlining how we are inextricably linked to our material context. It is also especially compelling because the narrative highlights not abstract knowledge but the people who made the discoveries, their struggles, disagreements, triumphs, and interrelationships with each other and their social, political, and professional context. Importantly, Levitt highlights the contributions of several women who made key contributions to this process, even at times when they were not allowed to occupy paid academic positions or had their work confiscated by or credited to others; for me this made the book additionally significant. I highly recommend its purchase, in whatever format you prefer: fortunately it is available in Kindle, print, and audio options!

Wonderful Book for A Non-Science Person

Thoroughly enjoyable for someone for whom astronomy might as well be ancient Chinese language. So well written so that everyone, non-scientists and science geeks can appreciate.
I loved the whole explanation about atoms and the Big Bang. I loved the stories of the scientists.
Excellent narration, too.

Brilliant, What Honest Science Should Be

The details in the information presented is astonishing, weighty but with plenty to hold on to. It is a perfect presentation of what science must be without governments and corporations controlling what is published and outlawing all debate. The CDC, the WHO, and Facebook fact checkers would not allow this book to be read.

Mind blowing!

My jaw is on the floor. Wow. I am in awe of the nature of existence. This book tells the story of scientists’ discovery of things that are so incredible, I struggle to truly appreciate them. Such a good book. I’ll be chewing on this one for a while.

A joyful journey from beginning to end

The narration of in-depth scientific books for the layman requires authority and accessibility, and Chamberlain nailed it. wow

The work itself parallels that ability to make me understand, not treat me like an idiot or a world-renowned scientist. Threading that needle is hard, but Levitt did it beautifully.