Book Review: A Short History of Nearly Everything

Back in the 1980s, Time Magazine determined—I’m not sure how—that the most owned but least read book in American households was Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time. I wonder how Hawking felt about this: that while he was, by all scientific literature measures, a wildly successful author, he probably ran into a number of people who praised him for a work they had never cracked. Who truly understood anything about the history of the universe, save what might have been gleaned from a Nova documentary on PBS?

Just from the title alone, A Short History of Nearly Everything begs to give Hawking a run for his money in the least-read competition, except for the fact that the author is Bill Bryson, one of the most humorous, readable, everyman-friendly writers of non=fiction ever to grace retail shelves. And while the title itself would set any merely mortal author up for fantastic failure, with Bryson you know that he will succeed—not by covering literally everything but by spinning just enough strands of webby prose via historical anecdotes and well-chosen interview subjects to let you make the connections to whatever part of the universe you want to fit into the puzzle that is our universe.

The book should come with a warning to the family of the reader, however: they need to prepare to be subjected to many bits of jaw-dropping and sometimes devastating information that will come from the quavering lips of the reader, who must share this information as a way of processing the miracle—and more importantly the fragility—of our existence in this universe. In other words, not only are the odds ridiculously infinitesimal that humankind exists in this universe at all, but the ease with which we could be extinguished from that same existence is … well, discomforting, to say the least. After reading the chapter discussing how disturbingly small the meteorite that would end civilization would have to be, and how little warning we would get for said meteor, and how little could truly be done to stop it (hint: the movie Armageddon isn’t terribly, um, realistic), I found myself lying in bed at night, staring at my ceiling, thinking: it could all end … right … now! Fortunately, Bryson also makes sure we understand what a small role we self-centered humans really play in this universe, so I don’t feel nearly as bad since we won’t really be missed anyway….

Come to A Short History of Nearly Everything for Bryson’s irrepressibly warm and droll prose, and you’ll find you’ll find the science lessons sneaking up on you. Before you know it, you’ll be ready to hold your own at that surprise dinner date with Neil deGrasse Tyson.