“A Short History of Nearly Everything” by Bill Bryson – The Universe in a Nutshell

The history of our universe is, relative to us at least, virtually so infinitely long that we could not hope to learn it all in a single lifetime.

Thankfully though, us humans aren't the kind to be bogged by such challenges, and we have been trying to retrace the universe's history and understand how humanity has come to where it is today, and how we have come to know all that we have.

In A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson attempts to do just that; he tries to explain how and why humanity, and the universe as we know it in general, have come to develop from seemingly nothing into what we are today.

Naturally, Bryson doesn't simply pull all the facts out of his head and memory. To write this book, he set out on a long journey to interview some of the most famous and celebrated scientists and researchers of today. In other words, all the knowledge in this book is drawn from the most genius of archaeologists, mathematicians, researchers and anthropologists alive today.

If that worries you in terms of complexity, then you should stop right there, especially if you are acquainted with Bryson's previous works. He makes for the perfect textbook, explaining all of the concepts, even the more complicated ones, in a light, fun, enthusiastic, joyful and simple way, one the average person can quite easily understand.

If there is one thing that sets this apart from the other science books out there that try to answer these large, vague and existential questions, it's that Bryson truly shows his passion for the whole thing.

He is never content with simply discovering facts and then presenting them to you as such. He always does his best to go into the heart of the matter, trying to find out how those facts came to by known and discovered, the thought processes involving in the expansion of our knowledge and the breaching of new frontiers.

His excitement and tongue-in-cheek comments really lend this book a feel of slightly childish wonder, one that is rather infectious and will make you start yearning for all the answers to the questions that will most likely never have any concrete ones.

Let it be clear, this book does not contain any groundbreaking discoveries or anything of the sort; science buffs who have been studying these questions probably won't get a whole lot out of it.

From what I saw, it was designed for people such as myself whose knowledge on the matters of the universe's history and existence as well as the rise of civilization is rather vague and limited.

One thing is for certain, upon reading this book I came out with a palpable feeling of accomplishment, of having learned important things; after all, there is a certain comfort in learning how things work and have come to pass, if only because it dissipates the constant veil of mystery we live under.

All things taken into consideration, A Short History of Nearly Everything is a fun, entertaining, simple and still very educative book that will turn you into a real armchair scientist, teaching us all the important and interesting stuff textbooks have shamefully failed to instruct us in.

As I said before, unless you already have been actively exploring those big and unanswerable questions for a while, you can learn a lot from this book, and there is absolutely no way for me not to recommend it.

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Bill Bryson Personal site Bill Bryson is a best-selling author of American origin, being best-known for his humoristic works, often touching upon scientific themes or the English language itself. He lived in Britain for most of his life, where he skyrocketed in popularity with the publication of Notes from a Small Island, and a bit later, A Short History of Nearly Everything.