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I finished writing Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything last week and really enjoyed its entertaining, interesting, understandable and detailed look at all the weird and wonder things in this world we should have learned at school but didn’t due to a variety of differing factors. Bryson himself got the inspiration for this book whilst on a continental plane flight, looking out of the window over the clouds and realising just how little of this world he  – and if the book sales are anything to go by, we – didn’t know about this incredibly fascinating, complex, and wonderful world – and surrounding universe – we live in.

Bryson covers not only all the strains of sciences, all aspects of the physical universe – both in the macro and micro scale, evolutionary history, extinctions. But, all the many, weird and wonderful characters who have featured throughout history in bringing us to the – still, limited – understanding we have today of this world around us. The book does a great job of keeping the topic’s lively and interesting without unnecessarily dumbing it down. Bryson also brilliantly illustrates just how much of a colossal fluke it is that us humans are here where we are at this point in time. Humans were not pre-ordained to take perch at the top of the food chain, human evolution has been the result of thousands upon thousands of freak events, flukes of nature and downright miracles to continue to this point in history.

Finishing the book you are confronted with not only feelings of satisfaction for knowing just that bit more about the world and its many matter and forces around you. But, more importantly, are left with a strong feeling of wonder and appreciation for being part of this incredible miracle to be living and breathing on this wonderful sphere of Nitrogen, Oxygen, Carbon, and other elemental matter – Planet Earth.

Great read, interesting, informative and fascinating at the same time. Well worth a look at. Five out of five stars.