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Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time
Dava Sobel · back to the book
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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorThe Ascent of Man
Jacob Bronowski · 448 pages
Traces the development of science and the discoveries that have made man unique among animal species.
Color: A Natural History of the Palette
Victoria Finlay · 448 pages
The Invention of Air
Steven Johnson · 254 pages
Bestselling author Steven Johnson recounts—in dazzling, multidisciplinary fashion—the story of the brilliant man who embodied the relationship between science, religion, and politics for America’s Founding Fathers. The Invention of Air is a book of world-changing ideas wrapped around a compelling narrative, a story of genius and violence and friendship in the midst of sweeping historical change th
The Making of the Atomic Bomb
Richard Rhodes · 886 pages
Here for the first time, in rich, human, political, and scientific detail, is the complete story of how the bomb was developed, from the turn-of-the-century discovery of the vast energy locked inside the atom to the dropping of the first bombs on Japan. Few great discoveries have evolved so swiftly -- or have been so misunderstood. From the theoretical discussions of nuclear energy to the brig
A Little History of Science
William F. Bynum · 272 pages
Science is wonderful. It tells us about the infinite reaches of space, the tiniest living organism, the human body and the history of our planet. Science has always been about making sense of the world and harnessing its power. From ancient Greek philosophers through Einstein and Watson and Crick to the computer-assisted scientists of today, men and women have wondered, examined, experimented, cal
The Day the Universe Changed: How Galileo's Telescope Changed the Truth
James Burke · 353 pages
Quantum Supremacy
Michio Kaku · 352 pages
Periodic Tales: The Curious Lives of the Elements
Hugh Aldersey-Williams · 430 pages
"In the spirit of A SHORT HISTORY OF NEARLY EVERYTHING, an energetic and wide-ranging book of discovery and discoverers, of exploitation and celebration, and of superstition and science, all in search of the ways the chemical elements are woven into our culture, history, and language"--
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Rebecca Skloot · 381 pages
The Discoverers: A History of Man's Search to Know His World and Himself
Daniel J. Boorstin · 747 pages
Tells the ongoing story of the progressive discovery by man of the nature of the observable world and universe.
The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science
Richard Holmes · 554 pages
"The Age of Wonder' is Richard Holmes' first major work of biography for a decade. It has been inspired by the scientific ferment that swept through Britain at the end of the 18th century, and which Holmes now radically redefines as 'the revolution of Romantic Science."
Coming of Age in the Milky Way
Timothy Ferris · 495 pages
From the second-century celestial models of Ptolemy to modern-day research institutes and quantum theory, this classic book offers a breathtaking tour of astronomy and the brilliant, eccentric personalities who have shaped it. From the first time mankind had an inkling of the vast space that surrounds us, those who study the universe have had to struggle against political and religious preconcepti
Tomorrowland: Our Staggering Journey from Science Fiction to Science Fact
Steven Kotler · 284 pages
The Lunar Men: Five Friends Whose Curiosity Changed the World
Jenny Uglow · 608 pages
Einstein: His Life and Universe
Walter Isaacson · 704 pages
The first full biography of Albert Einstein since all of his papers have become available shows how his scientific imagination sprang from the rebellious nature of his personality. Biographer Isaacson explores how an imaginative, impertinent patent clerk--a struggling father in a difficult marriage who couldn't get a teaching job or a doctorate--became the locksmith of the mysteries of the atom an
The Alchemy of Air: A Jewish Genius, a Doomed Tycoon, and the Discovery That Changed the Course of History
Thomas Hager · 326 pages
A sweeping history of tragic genius, cutting-edge science, and the discovery that changed billions of lives--including your own.At the dawn of the twentieth century, humanity was facing global disaster. Mass starvation, long predicted for the fast-growing population, was about to become a reality. A call went out to the world's scientists to find a solution. This is the story of the two enormously
To Engineer Is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design
Henry Petroski · 247 pages
How did a simple design error cause one of the great disasters of the 1980s--the collapse of the walkways at the Kansas City Hyatt Regency Hotel? What made the graceful and innovating Tacoma Narrows Bridge twist apart in a mild wind in 1940? How did an oversize waterlily inspire the magnificent Crystal Palace, the crowning achievement of Victorian architecture and engineering? These are some of th
Nine Algorithms That Changed the Future: The Ingenious Ideas That Drive Today's Computers
John MacCormick · 219 pages
The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger
Marc Levinson · 395 pages
In April 1956, a refitted oil tanker carried fifty-eight shipping containers from Newark to Houston. From that modest beginning, container shipping developed into a huge industry that made the boom in global trade possible. The Box tells the dramatic story of the container's creation, the decade of struggle before it was widely adopted, and the sweeping economic consequences of the sharp fall in t
Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet
Katie Hafner, Matthew Lyon · 304 pages
Twenty five years ago, it didn't exist. Today, twenty million people worldwide are surfing the Net. Where Wizards Stay Up Late is the exciting story of the pioneers responsible for creating the most talked about, most influential, and most far-reaching communications breakthrough since the invention of the telephone. In the 1960's, when computers where regarded as mere giant calculators, J.C.R.
Profiles of the Future: An Inquiry into the Limits of the Possible
Arthur C. Clarke · 256 pages
The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer
Siddhartha Mukherjee · 571 pages
The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer is a book written by Siddhartha Mukherjee, an Indian-born American physician and oncologist. Published on 16 November 2010 by Scribner, it won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction.
Tuxedo Park: A Wall Street Tycoon and the Secret Palace of Science That Changed the Course of World War II
Jennet Conant · 352 pages
"In the fall of 1940, as German bombers flew over London and with America not yet at war, a small team of British scientists on orders from Winston Churchill carried out a daring transatlantic mission. The British unveiled their most valuable military secret in a clandestine meeting with American nuclear physicists at the Tuxedo Park mansion of a mysterious Wall Street tycoon, Alfred Lee Loomis.
The Wright Brothers
David McCullough · 583 pages
Two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize David McCullough tells the dramatic story of the courageous brothers who taught the world how to fly. On a winter day in 1903, on the remote Outer Banks of North Carolina, two unknown brothers from Ohio, Wilbur and Orville Wright, changed history. The age of flight had begun with the first heavier-than-air powered machine carrying a pilot. Far more than a coup