The One Thing You Need to Know: The Simple Way to Understand the Most Important Ideas in Science

Marcus Chown

Jul 2023 · Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Peter Noble

About this audiobook

Rather than trying to bend your mind around all the vast and confounding details of things such as gravitational waves, electricity, and black holes, wouldn't it be easier to understand just one central concept from which everything else follows? If you've ever found yourself fascinated by the idea of quantum computing but feel a little overwhelmed by the mind-blowing subject of quantum mechanics or concerned by climate change but haven't been able to get to grips with the details of global warming, this book is for you. Let's take atoms, for example-what on earth are they? Well, if you start to think of them less like things you can't see with complex little nuclei and more like the alphabet of nature, they might start to feel a little more understandable. Or gravitational waves-why are they creating so much excitement? Think of them as the voice of space, vibrations on the drumskin of space-time-before delving into all their complexities. Chown explains the one thing you need to know to understand some of the most important scientific ideas of our time. Packed full of astounding facts, scientific history, and the entertaining personalities at the heart of the most pivotal discoveries about the workings of our universe, this is an accessible guide to all the tricky stuff you've always wanted to understand more about.

Ratings and reviews

Entertaining and easy to read, this book presents a one-sentence summary of the most important thing you need to know about twenty-one different science topics. Then, it expands on them in a concise way that makes difficult but important subjects understandable. It's the kind of thing that's fun to read cover-to-cover, or to contemplate one chapter at a time. For anyone with an interest in science, I highly recommend this well-narrated audiobook. Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received.

About the author

Marcus Chown is an award-winning writer, broadcaster, and a Royal Literary Fund Fellow at Brunel University. His book Breakthrough, The Ascent of Gravity was the Sunday Times 2017 Science Book of the Year. Marcus has also won The Bookseller's Digital Innovation of the Year for Solar System for iPad.

Peter Noble is an Audie Award-winning narrator who has recorded hundreds of audiobooks and audio dramas, including the 2021 Booker Prize winner, as well as Audible and New York Times bestsellers.