Books by author: Bill Bryson

I have read a few of Bill Bryson's books before, and I generally enjoy his self-mocking wit. I didn't feel the need to read any more after the excellent A Walk In the Woods, but when my book club chose this memoir, I was happy to oblige.

I'm a Stranger Here Myself is assembled in large part from articles Bryson wrote for a British Sunday newspaper, and it suffers from the pastiche effect. Bryson tries a bit too hard to find Americanisms that will sound quirky to his British readers. It's enjoyable, but forgettable.

This was a gift from Ed and Annie. It's a travelogue, and there are lots of interesting anecdotes about life in Australia.

Bill Bryson's latest book is an ambitious attempt to describe science's current view of humanity and our place in the universe, along with some backstory describing the people behind the scientific breakthroughs. In the 480 or so pages of prose, Bryson touches on everything from the big bang, to the makeup of the solar system, to elements, atoms, and quarks, to life itself, and to the fragility of our position in the universe.

It's a surprisingly successful undertaking. I hold three degrees in engineering, so it's fair to say that I know a thing or two about science. I've been exposed to most of the ideas in this book at one time or another, but never have I seen such a broad range of modern scientific thought articulated so well for a lay audience. Sure, Bryson probably spends too much time describing the social peccadilloes of famous (and not so famous) scientists, but although they are irrelevant to the value of the science, they do highlight the humanity of our scientific forefathers. I particularly appreciated that Bryson attempts to give credit to the scientists who first discovered particular phenomena rather than those who are credited by popular history.

If there's one core message in A Short History of Nearly Everything, it's that human life is precariously positioned. Geologically speaking, we've been on the planet for a infinitesimal timespan, and we've done a lot of things that are likely to throw the ecology of planet Earth sufficiently out of balance to force us into extinction. Surprisingly, no fingers are pointed (the environmental policies of the current Bush administration are incredibly destructive, but they are not mentioned). Clearly, Bryson makes his political points more subtly than I would.

Bryson is an entertaining writer, and this book is better than the other two of his that I've read (A Short History of Nearly Everything and In a Sunburned Country). Here, he describes his adventures while hiking portions of the Appalacian Trail. The trail itself is a 2,000+ mile behemoth stretching along nearly the entire Eastern coast of the United States, along the Appalacian mountain range. It is one of our national treasures in spite of its relative obscurity, and Bryson aptly conveys his sense of awe, both at its majesty and at the tremendous willpower it requires of its hikers.

The book is informative, often amusing, and never boring. I'm inspired to head out into the woods, though I'll probably continue to stick to day hikes.