BS: Has anyone read this...?

Subject: RE: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Jun 04 - 08:31 AM

Odd, as I think Mr. Bryson is not a very good writer at all, nor is he very funny. I could never understand why people read his books. All a matter of taste...I guess.

Subject: RE: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 16 Jun 04 - 08:19 AM

It's a good read and I think it has more to do with the history of science than science itself.

Subject: RE: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: GUEST,noddy
Date: 16 Jun 04 - 07:33 AM

Does that mean it may become essential reading for Science Students.

Subject: RE: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 16 Jun 04 - 06:43 AM

I have started to read it and was amazed - The first description of how the Universe started that I really understood!

Good book.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: Ellenpoly
Date: 16 Jun 04 - 03:27 AM

Be prepared, though. This is unlike his other books. It isn't particularly funny, and at times can be pretty dense. He's taken on a hefty subject and does his best to unravel it in as un-complex a way as possible. I never finished it, but that's my own laziness, and has nothing to do with the author!

..xx..e

Subject: RE: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: Mudlark
Date: 15 Jun 04 - 10:42 PM

Couldn't happen to a better writer. Hilarious when writing about places and people, he is also entertaining when writing about words..."everything else" doesn't seem like such a stretch.

Thanks for posting.

Subject: RE: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: Sorcha
Date: 15 Jun 04 - 08:40 PM

No, I hadn't, so thanks! I find Bill Bryson to be blindingly funny!

Subject: BS: Has anyone read this...?
From: Shanghaiceltic
Date: 15 Jun 04 - 07:29 PM

I like Bill Bryson's writing but I did not know of this one, anyone read it.

Bryson's scientific journey wins award
By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
(Filed: 15/06/2004)


Bill Bryson, the American travel writer and humourist, last night became the unlikely winner of an award for science writing.

   
Bill Bryson: also shortlisted for Samuel Johnson prize
Bryson is better known for his wry descriptions of English B&Bs and smalltown America than disentangling the finer points of cosmology and quantum physics.

But last night A Short History of Nearly Everything, his first foray into science writing and billed as his "ultimate journey", won the £10,000 general prize of the Aventis Prizes for Science Books.

His decision to write the book was greeted with some scepticism before publication. Even afterwards, one leading science writer carped in a review that "his grasp of the complexities of subjects such as cosmology and quantum physics - the real nitty-gritty of science - is poor".

But last night, in an announcement at a Royal Society dinner in London, Bryson joined the ranks of previous winners, including such luminaries as Prof Stephen Hawking, Sir Roger Penrose, the black hole theorist, and Prof Steve Jones, the Telegraph science page columnist.

The book has also been shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson prize, Britain's most valuable non-fiction prize, which will be awarded tonight at the Savoy.

Lord Winston, chairman of the judging panel, said the shortlist of six was outstanding but Bryson was selected because his book "will communicate science to the widest possible audience in an intelligent and highly accessible way".

Lord May of Oxford, President of the Royal Society, and Dr Dirk Oldenburg, chairman of the board of management of the Aventis Foundation, presented the £10,000 prize to Bryson and £1,000 to each of the shortlisted authors.

The £10,000 junior prize was won by Nick Arnold and Tony De Saulles, the illustrator, with Really Rotten Experiments (Scholastic Children's Books), which is packed with revolting experiments designed to introduce children to the gruesome side of science.

Arnold and De Saulles won the junior prize in 1997 for Blood, Bones and Body Bits and were also shortlisted for last year's prize for The Terrible Truth about Time.