Periodic Tales: The Curious Lives of the Elements
Hugh Aldersey-Williams
THE PHENOMENAL SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
'Science writing at its best. If only chemistry had been like this at school' Matt Ridley
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Everything in the universe is made of them, including you. Like you, the elements have personalities, attitudes, talents, shortcomings, stories rich with meaning.
Here you'll meet iron that rains from the heavens and noble gases that light the way to vice. You'll learn how lead can tell your future while zinc may one day line your coffin. You'll discover what connects the bones in your body with the Whitehouse in Washington, the glow of a streetlamp with the salt on your dinner table.
Unlocking their astonishing secrets and colourful pasts, Periodic Tales is a voyage of wonder and discovery, showing that their stories are inextricable from the stories of our own lives.
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'A love letter to the chemical elements. Aldersey-Williams is full of good stories and he knows how to tell them well' Sunday Telegraph
'The history, science, art, literature and everyday applications of all the elements from aluminium to zinc' The Times
'Great fun to read and an endless fund of unlikely and improbable anecdotes' Financial Times
Product Details
About Hugh Aldersey-Williams
Reviews for Periodic Tales: The Curious Lives of the Elements
Matt Ridley Immensely engaging and continually makes one sit up in surprise
Sunday Times
Splendid ... enjoyable and polished
Observer
Full of good stories and he knows how to tell them well ... an agreeable jumble of anecdote, reflection and information
Sunday Telegraph
Great fun to read and an endless fund of unlikely and improbable anecdotes ... sharp and often witty
Financial Times
A joyous romp through the chemical elements
Today, BBC Radio 4
Not only a cultural history of the elements, it is also a lament to the loss of science as a hobby
Economist
A flashily brainy book, crammed with literary references and held together by a personal quest to collect as many elements as possible
Telegraph
'Elements are fun' is the essential premise of Hugh Aldersey-Williams's new book and by heck he's right ... Aldersey-Williams mourns the fact chemistry isn't really sexy any more; Periodic Tales is a step towards it getting its mojo back
Metro
Imaginative and fun ... almost every page yields a nugget
Nature