"The Disappearing Spoon: Uncovering the Fascinating History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements"

Capt Fitz: Where was this book when I studied chemistry 60 years ago?
Besides being informative in the fields of physics and chemistry it was fascinating to learn the funny and sad stories of the people involved.

United States on Sep 14, 2023

Amazon Customer: Book's used condition ('good') was as expected and as promised. Tracking capability is always excellent with Amazon. Delivery was faster than promised!

Canada on Jul 29, 2023

Jennifer: I really enjoyed this book and learned lots about the elements, their discovery, histories and weird properties. I love when authors liven up science or history books with fun anecdotal stories and that happens here. There is plenty of technical stuff in the book too though. The chapter of bubble science was really fun but the following chapter delved into quantum physics and that's just a bit much for me.

Overall, I think this is great for someone who has a decent understanding of chemistry and wants to learn more but if you only know the basics this might be a bit much. To put it into perspective I think having done grade 11 chem is probably a good base for understanding the majority of the book.

Canada on Dec 05, 2022

amazon4rkbamazon4rkb: 𝙳𝚒𝚍 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚔𝚗𝚘𝚠...

...𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚊𝚛𝚎 118 𝚎𝚕𝚎𝚖𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚜 𝚒𝚗 𝚊𝚕𝚕?

...𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚘𝚜𝚖𝚒𝚞𝚖 𝚒𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚍𝚎𝚗𝚜𝚎𝚜𝚝 𝚎𝚕𝚎𝚖𝚎𝚗𝚝?

...𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚠𝚎 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚕𝚎𝚏𝚝-𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚍𝚎𝚍 𝚊𝚝 𝚜𝚞𝚋-𝚌𝚎𝚕𝚕𝚞𝚕𝚊𝚛 𝚕𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚕?

...𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚊 𝚜𝚌𝚒𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚒𝚜𝚝* 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚗𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚍 41 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎𝚜 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝚗𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛 𝚠𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙽𝚘𝚋𝚎𝚕?

...𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚎𝚕𝚎𝚖𝚎𝚗𝚝 𝚗𝚞𝚖𝚋𝚎𝚛 137 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚋𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚏𝚒𝚗𝚊𝚕 𝚋𝚘𝚡 𝚒𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚒𝚘𝚍𝚒𝚌 𝚝𝚊𝚋𝚕𝚎?

𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚒𝚘𝚍𝚒𝚌 𝚝𝚊𝚋𝚕𝚎 𝚒𝚜 𝚊𝚜 𝚏𝚞𝚗𝚍𝚊𝚖𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚊𝚕 𝚝𝚘 𝚌𝚑𝚎𝚖𝚒𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚢 (𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚙𝚑𝚢𝚜𝚒𝚌𝚜 𝚝𝚘𝚘)...

India on May 31, 2021

B. Leblanc: 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...

Canada on Nov 23, 2012

Chris Gladis: One of the prettiest books I have on my shelves right now is Theodore Gray's The Elements, a visual collection of all the elements that make up the physical universe. "Everything you can drop on your foot," as he says. In it, he provides wonderful pictures and descriptions of the elements that we know, arranged as they would be in the periodic table. It's a gorgeous book, one that everyone should have - especially if you have children. If you want your kids to become interested in science and investigating the world around them, you could do far worse than to have this book on your shelves.

Eventually, though, they'll be old enough and canny enough to ask, "Well, how do we know all this? Where did we find these things, and how? And why are they in this order?" That's the point where you hand them The Disappearing Spoon, sit back, and let Sam Kean take over.

The story of the elements, and our understanding of them, is governed just as much by personality as by p-shells, as much by competition as by charge, as much by ego as by electrons. While the elements themselves don't pay any attention to human affairs, the quest to understand the building blocks of matter have...

United States on Jun 23, 2012

J. Kimbrough: If you never really had an interest in Chemistry or it has been a long time since you have taken courses in this subject, this book is not a review of Chemistry; but a really good look at the "background" of the human dimensions and some of the esoteric advances of Chemistry as seen through the discovery of the elements and the development of the periodic table over time.

The author has a "unique" sense of humor and his writing style gets you into the "feel" of the vignettes he writes about the various elements and people who discovered them. Having a BA in Chemistry ( I never really used it in my career over 35 years), from this book I learned a lot of historical facts about Chemistry my professors never told me or some of the unique uses and "bizarre" properties of the chemical elements.

This is very good popular science book and I recommend it to someone who is not into the "science" of science of Chemistry, but wants to learn about the elements with a historical & "sociological" prospective.

The graphics and footnotes in the kindle edition worked well. I had to print a copy of the periodic table out to review when I was reading. It was too difficult...

Germany on Feb 03, 2012

JwP: Ah, the elements, with all their little atoms and zinging electrons and proton/neutron nuclei. Just chemistry or physics, well, science at any rate. After reading Sam Kean's debut book, The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements, I knew more about the elements, not the weather kind. Or, I learned history. Anyway, I learned something from the book and what I learned was basically this: science is as crazy as you think it is if not more so, and I do mean mad scientist crazy, not just run of the mill crazy.

Anyway, on with the review.

First time book author Kean attempts to make science relatable. Or simple. Sometimes both. The triumphs and tribulations of discovering elements are both represented. Sometimes there were immense highs in the process of filling out the Periodic Table of Elements (you know the thing I mean: the large wall hogging chart in your Chem class that you hated to use but could never quite avoid looking at for help when you were floundering on your tests). And oh the things you wouldn't believe about how elements have played a part history from influencing wars...

United States on Nov 30, 2010