The disappearing spoon

by Sam Kean

English language

Published April 7, 2010

ISBN:: 978-0-316-05164-4

(46 reviews)

The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements, is a 2010 book by science reporter Sam Kean. The book was first published in hardback on July 12, 2010 through Little, Brown and Company and was released in paperback on June 6, 2011 through Little, Brown and Company's imprint Back Bay Books. The book focuses on the history of the periodic table by way of short stories showing how a number of chemical elements affected their discoverers, for either good or bad. People discussed in the book include the physicist and chemist Marie Curie, whose discovery of radium almost ruined her career; the writer Mark Twain, whose short story "Sold to Satan" featured a devil who was made of radium and wore a suit made of polonium; and the theoretical physicist Maria Goeppert-Mayer, who earned a …

3 editions

Eduardo Santiago reviewed The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The Disappearing Spoon' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

Delightful, although somewhat convoluted - necessarily so, I suppose, since the elements are so deeply intertwined among each other, as are the humans involved in their stories. At heart this is really a book about relationships, which is perhaps what makes it so enthralling to me. Kean writes with enthusiasm about a subject he deeply loves. His organization - the way he lays out sections and chapters - shows a great deal of planning and forethought. It's original and curiously effective.

This was especially fun to read alongside [b:The Elements|12651327|Elements A Visual Exploration of Every Known Atom in the Universe|Theodore Gray|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1404579085l/12651327.SX50.jpg|6873223], that gorgeous coffee-table book that is just too hard to get through otherwise. I would read a bit of Disappearing Spoon, get intrigued, refer to Elements, ogle the pictures, learn something different, and back and forth. I highly recommend this way of reading.

markm reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

A non-technical historically-based introduction to chemistry based on the periodic table. Well done.
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The author occasionally uses casual modern English. It is unnecessary and distracting.

The author states that the association of iodine deficiency with mental retardation made Bertrand Russell realize that mental function depends on the material conditions of the brain. I don't believe it. After all, Heraclitus of Ephesus said, A blow to the head will confuse a man's thinking; a blow to the foot has no such effect. This cannot be the result of an immaterial soul., and Russell wrote a great history of philosophy.

The author says that "Virtually every hospital in the world uses tracers, and a whole branch of medicine, radiology, deals exclusively in that line." I think he means the field of Nuclear Medicine.

gimley reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

I started reading this by accident. I forgot why I'd gotten it (still don't remember) and hoped it was a novel as I'd abandoned the science side of the two cultures once I figured out their subject matter, physicality, was just the surface of existence. It was interesting to read of the brilliant practitioners of the trade being so caught up with petty squabbles, or their own success, not understanding the surfaceness of those pursuits, confirming my decision.

And yet there's an aesthetic to their deconstruction of everyday physicality. The periodic table, which provides the cast of characters, starts off seeming so immutable, and yet it had to be discovered in the first place, before it could grace the walls of a chemistry class. Atoms, named for that which could be subdivided no further, have become just the starting points; objects that can be taken apart like LEGO constructions and made to do all sorts of tricks -- to the point that the language we speak makes the results nearly impossible to speak about. If financial types can be "masters of the universe," why not these scientists, who can be just as arrogant?

Written to require no prior science knowledge, it still managed to make me feel ignorant but unable to blame my lack of the prerequisites. But ignorant, maybe, in a good way, like the quality fear you experience reading a thriller.

Still, I can now say I understand, at least in a "narrative" way, how MRIs work, why titanium is used for hip replacements, why the silicon-based life forms of science fiction are doubtful, the background of the Fermi paradox which is "solved" in book 2 of The Three Body Problem (which I reviewed also, but can't remember what I'd said), why Americans dropped the second 'i' from 'aluminium' and maybe even why Linus Pauling stuck to his belief in megadoses of vitamin C even when there was no evidence for it.

Nic reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Excellent

vitriolix reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

very interesting and entertaining.

Ikwezi reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

A surprisingly readable history of the great men and women of chemistry and physics, although I found his literary technique of anthropomorphizing the actions of subatomic particles irritating.

Realgnomidad reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

I really liked this book - it was informative, fun paced, had interesting real characters with ego and hubris and genius, and filled in some knowledge gaps for me. I'd read it even if you are not too terribly interested in science, it's still a good read.

Lavinia reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

Marie Curie used to provoke jealousy in colleagues' wives when she'd invite them into closets to see her glow-in-the-dark experiments. Lewis and Clark swallowed mercury capsules across the country and their campsites are still detectable by the poison in the ground. Why did Gandhi hate iodine? Why did the Japanese kill Godzilla with missiles made of cadmium? And why did tellurium lead to the most bizarre gold rush in history? These and many other fascinating stories in....

Jill reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Stories about science!

settingshadow reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Remember your favorite chemistry teacher? The one who always anthropormorphized chemical compounds and added drama and flavor to their lectures? This book is a lot like that.

Okay, fine, chemistry is a substantial part of my livelihood, so maybe I have more fond chemistry-based memories than then average person. Nonetheless, The Disappearing Spoon should be as enticing to those who never took a science class outside of distribution requirements as well as those of us whose favorite class was organic chemistry.

To be honest, I was pretty nervous about this book; as a biochemist, it makes me a little uncomfortable to admit that there's anything interesting outside of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen (and a touch of phosphorus and sulfur.) But Kean's writing is the definition of compulsively readable.

Drama is brought by the often argumentative, usually eccentric and always genius scientists who founded the principals of modern chemistry. In addition, …

J. J. Zepfanman @book reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Even if you took chemistry in college, you'll likely come across plenty of new concepts in the last 100 pages of this book. Kean does a great job giving us a crash course in the way atoms operate, but I still found myself getting lost in some of his brief descriptions of chemical processes.

That being said, the tales about the elements that Kean chooses are absolutely fascinating. He does a good job including key women in his stories and he fuses this human element with universal concepts surrounding the periodic table.

Jamie reviewed The disappearing spoon by Sam Kean

Review of 'The disappearing spoon' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

There are some really excellent stories, here. A couple of them stray a bit from the central premise or weren't sufficiently dumbed down for me (non-chemist) but my interest rarely strayed for more than a moment.