This is another recommendation from my old man. It is actually his copy (complete with hand-marked copy editing, haha). This was my first read by Bryson, and I quite enjoyed it. Brittany has read most of his catalogue, and got so excited when I picked this thing up, that she bought me 4 or 5 other of his books to read. Anyway, the premise of this gem is that Bryson was interested in science, but could never pay attention to the dry text that is so ubiquitous in science writing. So he set out to explain science in a way that is captivating (and even entertaining). In my opinion, he succeeded. It doesn’t hurt matters that he is a pretty funny writer. I definitely recommend this book to fellow nerds.