I finished the book, which is praise in it’s self from me, given the huge amount of books that I start and never finish. I think it’s a question of momentum, I start out reading the books with the greatest intentions, and if the first few chapters are good I build up a good momentum, really good books (which are rear indeed), keep the momentum going from the start, while most books hit a slow down in the middle somewhere. The key to me finishing a book, is whether or not I have enough momentum to carry me through the middle bit of a book, with A short History of Nearly Everything, I did.

It’s starts well, with some big space science and early physics, which to me anyway is interesting, then we start to go into the world of quantum physics, which lets face it could be bunkum and most people wouldn’t know. Then we get to the bit I struggled with, not because of the writing because Bryson does his best (which is very good) to bring the subject to life, and keep your interest, but I’m sorry biology, and the world of mosses, and plankton, just doesn’t grip me. Fortunately the momentum from the first half of the book, carried me through this, which brought me onto the accent of man as it where, which again is mainly conjecture and guess work, but entertaining non the less.

The main theme of the book, is doom, or more specifically impending doom. The first half of the book talks about how the earth is overdue, a large meteor, earthquake, shift in magnetic poles, or really large volcanic eruption, all of which would ofcourse wipe out quite a lot.

The second half is then filled with how we just about managed to get here followed up with a finally telling of how we’ve wiped out more species of animals and plants in the last few thousand years, mainly because we are careless and stupid.

That rather dower summary aside it is a good book, and I did enjoy reading it (hence why I finished it), Science can be a terribly dull subject, but fortunately Bill Bryson is not a terribly dull writer, I do think you will need to have some scientific inklings to enjoy the book.

I think I’ll give it 3 stars*
*my star rating is totally made up and has no real relevance to the quality of the book, I mean I didn’t even tell you 3 stars out of how many