Customer Reviews

The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"For we can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth." -- 2 Corinthians 13:8 (NKJV)

In recent years, science has increasingly been described in new ways by clever writers who can combine several parts of entertainment with every foundational bit of information. For me, The Disappearing Spoon represents a new element, one that has more entertainment ingredients than ever before . . . but also a good bass line that continually develops the theme of how atoms and subatomic particles behave. It's a whole new kind of jazz, and I liked it.

I also like boysenberry pie, but if I eat too much of that delight, it doesn't agree with me. At times I felt the same way about The Disappearing Spoon, as it often overfilled me with cocktail tidbits that didn't really advance the story.

The book's overall design is to describe how the periodic table evolved and what can be understood by looking at the placement of various elements. I must admit that it was all vaguely familiar. It must have been covered in some chemistry or geology class I took along the way. So far so good. A positive addition was an update on newer elements, discoveries about older elements, a connection to quantum mechanics, and a link to biology. Very nice.

Mr. Kean acutely fleshes out his tales with many references to the scientists, how facts were uncovered or obscured, and more than a few ironies about Nobel prizes and personal habits. It's sort of history of science with a gossipy slant.

To demonstrate key points, the book draws on well-known historical moments to demonstrate how science can shed new light on events that puzzle and fascinate the public. Some of this works well (such as in dealing with spy poisonings) but less well in other cases (the uniforms the French wore on the way to Moscow). A good editor could have tightened up this aspect quite a bit.

There's also some plain old gossip. I could have done without that.

The book also takes random dives in dating various things, but does so in a sporadic fashion that didn't add much to the story . . . other than to show that scientists can make mistakes, too.

Did I have fun? Sure. But the information I'll retain could have been neatly captured into about a quarter of the space. I'm not sure I had that much fun to warrant the extra length.

I also notice that the publisher charges way too much for the Kindle version. How scientific is that?

With one exception, this book was a delight from cover to cover. Using the elements of the periodic table as his launching points, Mr. Kean take us on a series of exhilarating romps through the history of science, touching on topics as diverse as the search for extraterrestrial life, a backyard nuclear reactor, and the bubbles in a glass of beer. Not since the essays of the late Isaac Asimov have I encountered such an entertaining blend of anecdote and scientific exposition.
My delight in the book was muted, however, by an error which is -to say the least - surprising in a professional science writer. Not to put too fine a point on it, there are a number of passages in which the author appears to be unaware of what the word "galaxy" means. In a discussion of the Drake Equation, for instance, he refers to the Solar System as "our own galaxy". In an earlier chapter, he describes the impact of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 on Jupiter as "the first intergalactic collision humans ever witnessed". I am not aware of any astronomical findings that indicate that the comet (or the planet Jupiter!) originated outside the Milky Way Galaxy, and can only ruefully conclude that Mr. Kean is using "intergalactic" as a synonym for "extraterrestrial".
For the record, a galaxy is a huge system of stars and other matter, thousands of light-years in diameter and having a mass billions or trillions of times greater than that of our sun. "Galaxy" is not a synonym for "planet" or "solar system", despite what generations of television writers may have taught us. The author of this otherwise fine book should know better.

Book comes in perfect condition. Great for my daughter side study. She has a lot of laugh reading the funny paragraphs. She is still reading it so wait until the end!

I became acquainted with Sam Kean's work with his wonderful book "The violonist's thumb", an excellent work of popular science that covers the field of genetics in a humorous but always enthralling way. I expected more of the same with this earlier work, "The disappearing spoon", and by and large was not disappointed. However, this earlier book does betray the writer's relative inexperience: for the sake of simplicity or that of a good tale, many analogies are for example pushed beyond usefulness. Many biographical or historical points are also depicted in stark black and white tones that rob them of any real relevance other than as plot points in a rousing yarn. I was annoyed, for example, by the demonization of characters like Fritz Haber (of fertilizer, but mostly of mustard gas fame) whose great fault, essentially, was in making terrible weapons for his country in a time of war. A more extensive depiction of the man's life would have shown mitigating circumstances for the choices he made in life; especially the pressure he was under for mere acceptance in early 20th century German society. (The American scientists who crafted the atom bomb are also responsible for the creation of a terrible weapon and for tens of thousands of deaths, but are not treated by Kean in such a brutal manner).

Other reviewers have pointed out a few factual errors here and there in the book, things that an editor's eye should have caught. A comet, for exmaple, is not on an "intergalactic" travel. A ribosome is not a protein. Most of these errors are small and easily corrected, but after encountering a few of them the reader starts to wonder about the rest of the information.

The main strength of this book, and a reason why it should definitely be found in any school's library, is that it presents science as fun. Not "Yeah, that's okay" fun, but rip-roaring fun. A such, it is recommended, and if it does have some faults it just shows that Kean is getting better as a writer, as shown by his second book.

The book is in great shape. As for the book itself, great, fascinating, very interesting, cant seem to stop reading until the end of a chapter.

This is five-star science writing at its best. Although the book's main theme is the periodic table of the elements - chemistry's rallying point - the scientific fields that are discussed are quite diverse. They include: various branches of physics, geology, palaeontology, biology and several others. But that's not all. The scientific discussions are blended into a backdrop of archaeology, history - from ancient through medieval to modern - as well as the occasional political and social machinations. And last, but definitely not least, the author has enriched almost every page with the ever-present, always-fascinating, often-confrontational and sporadically-baffling human element that many authors often omit.

As pointed out by at least one other reviewer, there are some technical errors; I found some in the discussions involving radioactivity and nuclear physics. But these minor shortcomings do not detract from the book's important qualities.

The writing style is very lively, friendly, often humorous/tongue-in-cheek, entertaining, widely accessible, never boring and quite captivating. In short: a page-turner. This book can be thoroughly enjoyed by anyone, especially those with a fascination for science: how it works, how some discoveries came about, some of the people involved (ancient to recent) and science's wonderful history. It is also a special treat for science buffs. I believe that this work is an important contribution towards making science understandable and fun for the general population. It may even inspire future Nobel Prize winners. To the author: well done!!

The author of this book assumes that the reader has at least a high-school level understanding of chemistry and atomic structure. For those, like myself, for whom high-school is a distant memory, the portions of the text dealing with the elements at a sub-atomic level can get a bit complicated and hard to follow at times. That being said though, the book never became so dense or technical that I lost interest. Mr Kean's easy manner of writing and witty takes on various subjects entertained me all the way through. A few critics have complained that the author focuses on too much biography and doesn't say enough about this or that, but these criticisms are unjustified in my mind. Kean did not set out to write a chemistry text and some may fid what he did create to be interesting and some will not. Complaining that the book does not provide what was never promised in the first place is unfair.

I dislike writing reviews for books because, well, I'm not never good at writing them. However, I enjoyed this book so much that I felt it would be wrong not to try and at least say something about it!

For someone like me, who is just wetting their toes when it comes to the world of science and it's history, this is a very informative and entertaining book. I've picked up so many interesting facts and pieces of history with regards to chemistry and science as a whole. I've recommended this book to many of my friends.

I highly recommend this to you as well.

Trust me, I tried. I enjoy books like this but whereas, say, Henry Petroski's books on engineering work for me, this just didn't. It's not the science so much as the way it was presented.

I found myself skipping completely over the explanation of each element and getting straight to the anecdotal parts about the scientists most closely associated with those particular elements. Those stories I mostly found interesting so maybe all this book needed was tighter editing.

I'm sure others will enjoy this thoroughly but this layperson just found it too much of a slog after awhile and gave up.

Buying this book was a bit of a crap-shoot for me. I wasn't quite sure if the content would prove interesting, but, geek that I am, I had to give it a shot.
I am glad that I was willing to take a chance. Written with engaging anecdotes, the author manages to draw the reader in to seemingly uninteresting subject matter. The story behind the title of the book is a good case in point, but far be it for me to spoil Kean's tale.
Despite his very reader-friendly style, it should be noted that there are places where the science may get a tad heavy for those with only a smattering of chemistry and physics (i.e. your friendly reviewer). I took the 'Russian novel' approach to the areas I had some difficulty understanding and slogged my way through them to get to the 'good stuff' (i.e. the stuff I understood).
Overall, I would highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn a bit more about the world of Science. Kean's tales are both entertaining and informative.
(One word of caution: be prepared for small amounts of ridicule when you tell others that your are reading a book about the history of the periodic table. I tried to talk my way out of this, but, ultimately, this is just a razzing you're going to have to take.)