How to Invent Everything: A Survival Guide for the Stranded Time Traveler

by Ryan North

The only book you need if you're going back in time

What would you do if a time machine hurled you thousands of years into the past. . . and then broke? How would you survive? Could you improve on humanity's original timeline? And how hard would it be to domesticate a giant wombat?

With this book as your guide, you'll survive--and thrive--in any period in Earth's history. Bestselling author and time-travel enthusiast Ryan North shows you how to invent all the modern conveniences we take for granted--from first principles. This illustrated manual contains all the science, engineering, art, philosophy, facts, and figures required for even the most clueless time traveler to build a civilization from the ground up. Deeply researched, irreverent, and significantly more fun than being eaten by a saber-toothed tiger, How to Invent Everything will make you smarter, more competent, and completely prepared to become the most important and influential person ever. You're about to make history. . . better.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, History, Humor, Time Travel, Technology, Audiobook

462 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 18, 2018

About the author

Hi, I'm Ryan! I was born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada in 1980 and since then have written several books. You can read my Wikipedia page for more, or check out my author site at RyanNorth.ca!

I'm the author of the webcomic Dinosaur Comics (that's the comic where the pictures don't change but the words do, it's better than it sounds and I've also done crazy things like turn Shakespeare into a choose-your-own-path adventure, write a comic for Marvel about a girl with all the powers of a squirrel, or mess up walking my dog so badly it made the news.

I'm working on more stuff as we speak, hopefully it's good

Reviews

[Ryan North · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wrote it! But I think it's the best thing I've ever written, so great work, past me.

In all seriousness though, it was a lot of fun to research and write, and if reading it is anything close to as entertaining and educational as writing it was, I think you'll have a great time with it!

[Jen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fellow preppers, bring it in for a huddle. I’ve got a manual you’ll want stuff in your bunker. (Am I being suggestive on purpose? I can’t tell anymore. Recent research into the concept of free will suggest that all these actions are downstream of unconscious processes for which I should not be held accountable. And if that is true, (putting aside cases in which pragmatic action is taken to sequester psychopaths from doing further harm through, perhaps, no fault of their own) these findings impugn the primary motives of retributive justice, and thus threaten the basis of our legal system. So maybe I shouldn’t open this can of worms and accept responsibility for all the sexual entendres which follow.) Have you ever, while deathly ill from ingesting several cases of magic markers, painted an impromptu canvas with the prism of your explosive vomit and saw the Mandelbrot set starring back at you? Then, upon further examination of its infinite self similarities, experienced a great longing to recapitulate the important discoveries of mankind? If condensed into a book to aid a stranded time traveler, it might be organized thus:

How to Tell What Time Period You’re Stranded In: A Handy Flowchart.

A Special Note If You Are Stranded Between 200,000 BCE and 50,000 BCE and You Are Thinking, “The Humans Here Are Crazy and I Am Definitely Doomed Forever”

The Five Fundamental Technologies You Need For Your Civilization:
Spoken Language.
Written Language.
Non-Sucky Numbers.
The Scientific Method.
Calorie Surplus.

Units of Measurement Are Arbitrary, but Here’s How You Can Reinvent the Standard Ones Used in This Book from Scratch.

Now We Are Become Farmers, the Devourers of Worlds.

What Will Other Humans Be Eating If I’m Stranded After They’ve Evolved but Before Agriculture and Selective Breeding Are a Thing, and How Can I Tell If It’s Poisonous, Because I Bet These Ancient Humans Are Eating Some Really Stupid Stuff?

Putting Down Roots: Useful Plants for the Stranded Time Traveler.

The Birds and the Bees: Useful Animals for the Stranded Time Traveler.

Basic Nutrition: What to Eat So You Won’t Die for At Least a While Longer.

Common Human Complaints That Can Be Solved by Technology:
“I’m Thirsty”
“I’m Hungry”
“I’m Sick”
“The Natural Resources I See Around Me Suck; I Want Better Ones”
“I’m Lazy; I Want a Machine to Do Work for Me”
“No, I Mean I’m So Lazy I Just Want to Flip a Switch and Have Machines Work As If by Magic” “It’s Late and I’m Cold, and I’d Like to Know How Late and How Cold It Is”
“I Want People to Think I’m Attractive”
“I Would Like to Have Some Cool Sex”
“I Want Things That Won’t Catch on Fire”
“There’s Nothing to Read”
“It Sucks Here and I Want to Go Literally Anywhere Else”
“I Want Everyone to Think I’m Smart”

Chemistry: What Are Things, and How Do I Make Things?

Major Schools of Philosophy Summed Up in a Few Quippy Sentences About High-Fives

The Basics of Visual Art, Including Some Styles You Can Steal.

Heal Some Body: Medicine and How to Invent It.

Basic First (And in Your Case, Only) Aid.

How to Invent Music, and Musical Instruments, and Music Theory, and Also We Included Some Really Great Songs for You to Plagiarize Too.

Computers: How to Turn Mental Labor into Physical Labor, So Then You Don’t Have to Think So Hard but Can Instead Just Turn a Crank or Whatever.

With the following appendices:
Technology Tree.
The Periodic Table.
Useful Chemicals, How to Make Them, and How They Can Definitely Kill You.
Logical Argument Forms.
Trigonometry Tables, Included Because You’ll Need Them When You Invent Sundials, but They’ll Also Be Useful If You Ever Decide to Invent Trigonometry.
Some Universal Constants That Took Humanity a While to Figure Out, and Which You Can Now Name After Yourself.
Frequencies for Various Notes, So You Can Play Those Cool Songs We Included.
A Bunch of Cool Gears and Other Fundamental Mechanisms.
Here’s Where Some Useful Human Parts Are and What They Do.


This book is written as a guide to help reconstruct civilization in the event of a time traveling mishap which leaves you stranded in an epoch denuded of all the hard won scientific and technological progress which most of us find indispensable, yet comprehend in the manner of Arthur C. Clark’s famous maxim regarding sufficiently advanced animatronic bears. But I’m sure it will serve as a terrific guide for the more probable emergencies which leer at us from space, nuclear silos, the atmosphere, political/religious pulpits, continued gain of function research on deadly viruses, and pissed off hyper-intelligent ungulates. In any of those instances, this book will likely be overkill, because we’ll at least have the ghostly relics of our first attempt to use as scaffolding for the next. Although, the hulking wreckage probably won’t be as useful as all the liquified-life that empowered our species to inflict a mortal wound upon itself. Also, irradiated earth isn’t great for pushing up caloric surpluses, and if you can’t venture onto the surface without insult to your physical integrity in the form of malicious particles and giant mutant ground sloths, it’s unlikely that construction will proceed apace. And if.. Well, I’m sorry I even brought it up! Maybe I’ll try my hand at some Mark Watney fan fiction, where he arrives back on earth only to find smoking, iridium enriched craters, sparklingly with silicates and foreboding botanical challenges. He’ll need food, and he’ll need ammo for his Spudzooka (for those of you unaware; if using acetylene, a potato can free itself from that barrel at upwards of 310 miles per hour) if he’s going to survive the reemergence of charismatic megafauna. In times of fitful slumber I have often experienced auditory hallucinations which traced the peripheral oscillations of sounds as yet unheard by the human race. One such sound, a dimly apprehended acoustic novelty, is (I must desperately imagine) the hollow thud of a clod of carbohydrates ricocheting from the thoracic cage of a Megatherium. The giant beast balancing its four ton bulk on its hind legs, black eyes moist from the kinetic sting deposited by the ballistic herbaceous perennial, arms (slowly and inexorably) akimbo, bodily conveying the universal grammar of; “What the fuck, man?” And what possible justification could you provide for attempting to annihilate this majestic beast by hammering, repeatedly, its manubrium and xiphoid process, with starchy slugs expelled from a metal cylinder by hellfire? Because it’s your manifest destiny to pillage the amino acids of other sentient life to power your metabolically expensive cognition? Does that supersede the Giant Mutant Ground Sloth’s right to continue its slow and unexamined life? Apparently!

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars -- I docked points for the entire bread/beer section, which referred to yeast as animals (????) -- they are fungi! (This is not a one-off either; there is an entire joke about this??) Except for that one glaring error, I really enjoyed this book, its tone, and its humor. The premise was so clever that I knew I wanted to make acquiring this book a priority at SDCC, and I'm fortunate to have gotten a signed copy! The premise: you have a time machine, but it broke. Now you are stranded sometime in the distant past (flowchart provided to help you/the stranded time traveller figure out when exactly you are). How are you to survive and thrive in comfort? Well, Ryan North (the one from the AU where time travel has been invented and you have been stranded, not the Ryan North who found the manual and published the book you have in front of real you) has an instruction manual on how to invent everything you need, from written and spoken language to medicine to electricity to radio to just about anything you could want.

Some favorite moments:
in an entry on horseshoes: before horseshoes were invented: "Humans hadn't helped any other animals wear shoes, which honestly seems like one of our most adorable achievements"

in an entry in the chemistry section about chlorine gas: "at high temperatures, [chlorine gas] also reacts with iron to produce chlorine-iron fires, which are about as safe as they sound (they are extremely not safe)."

in a section on human anatomy (hey, knowing about the body puts you ahead of 10,000s of years of human history, and can get your new civilization started out on the right... foot!): "Skeleton: there is a spooky wet skeleton hiding inside us all, a truly terrifying thought" -- agree, Ryan North, agree. Skeletons are almost as creepy as veins, which are also terrifying and inside you.

In the agriculture section (specifically the potato subsection): "Boil them, mash them, stick them in a stew, even cook them in oil to make delicious fries and potato chips." -- I see what you did there -- someone's a LOTR fan (well, two people -- in this case, Ryan North and also me).

Also, I heartily approve of the author's use of the term "horsies" to describe the grouping of horses and protohorses.

[Clare Hutchinson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This has a really fun premise - a guidebook on reinventing elements of modern civilization for a stranded time-traveller that does an entertaining job of explaining the basics of technology and historical progression. I learned a lot! I played along with a suspension of disbelief at first but then found I got easily annoyed at missing/skipping steps or instructions (how am I collecting all these gases? with beakers?), or thinking that such a thing wouldn't be possible without first inventing basic things like knives, or that there were entire missing sections that would be helpful in this case (how to build a decent shelter). And I hoped for a bit more literary content - more thoughtful musing on the progression of knowledge, how secrecy and racism prevented cultures from learning from each other, how interpersonal difficulties and society might prevent the reader from achieving the aims of the book, any note on things the reader should try to avoid inventing, invention of societal structures, etc. There were little asides on these but with such an ambitious text I hoped for a bit more, even at the end. Tell me how to invent not getting burned at the stake for being an obvious witch making penicillin and airplanes in 300 AD, Ryan!!!

However, I appreciated the wide scope of knowledge, I spent a LOT of time examining things and imagining how I might (or if I would be able to) invent them, and I think I could probably make a kiln.

[Peter Tillman · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is an outline of the history of technology, presented as a manual for stranded time-travelers who had rented the FC-3000 time machine. It starts cute: “REPAIR GUIDE: There are no user-serviceable parts inside the FC-3000.” Oops.

I think Arthur C. Clarke once remarked that the best evidence against the existence of time travel, was the remarkable absence of time travelers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_tr...

Still, it’s a clever handle for the book, but kind of a one-trick pony that quickly got old for me. The usual problem of writing humor. But who knows? You might like it. The author is a cartoonist: http://www.ryannorth.ca/

The history of technology part seems accurate, although the “future” periodic table in the appendix just irritated me, as a former chemist. About there, I started skimming. Most of the factual stuff was old-hat for me. I don’t think I’m really the intended audience, and my 2-star rating is definitely an outlier. Might be closer to 1.5 stars, really. Not a keeper!

I won a copy of the book from the publisher through a Goodreads giveaway. Thanks!

[Diane Hernandez · Rating 4 out of 5]

How to Invent Everything is “a complete cheat sheet to civilization”. You’re welcome.

Beginning with hilarious FAQs about your new state-of-the-art FC3000 rental market time machine, the book then explains how to invent everything and restart civilization in case the machine breaks down in the past. It starts at a basic level of civilization, language, and continues all the way through making computers to do all the work. Along the way it touches on math, science, agriculture, zoology, nutrition, sexuality, philosophy, art, music and basic medicine.

When I initially picked How to Invent Everything on Edelweiss+, I thought it was non-fiction. Imagine my surprise and delight when I quickly realized it was fictional in the vein of my favorite book, the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Except it starts in the future and goes backwards to present day. Sorta. Alas, it is both fiction and non-fiction at the same time. Good luck, time travelers, sorting it out.

This is a very interesting book. It includes actual recipes for creating items. However, there is also a disclaimer in the front stating no one is responsible if something happens to you while using the recipes so hmmm. I liked How to Invent Everything for its humor and some of the information is interesting to know. It may be useful in case of a zombie (or other type of) apocalypse. However, if you are a doom’s day prepper, buy this book in paper format since who knows how long those solar chargers in your bug-out kit will be able to charge your kindle. 4 stars!

Thanks to Riverhead Books and Edelweiss+ for an advance copy.

[Charles Haywood · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book, a somewhat smug but informative trip through the technologies that create and enhance civilization. It even has a clever frame—what would you do if you were stuck in the past due to a time machine failure? (You must end up in a past where there were other humans but no civilization; a helpful flow chart makes clear that ending up in other time periods will not lead to a lengthy life for you.) Everything from food production to tanning to smelting to computers is covered, though each briefly; the writing is brisk and often funny (even if the same jokes are used too often and some sections are a bit padded out). And since I am a trivia master, and actually knew already at least 95% of the things covered in this book, I can attest that the accuracy level is very high.

But the book jars the reader by the constant intrusion of social justice warrior cant. We are didactically instructed, despite that survival obviously requires a firm grasp of reality, that “Of course, not all women have vaginas, and not all people with vaginas are women.” The stupid abbreviations “CE” and “BCE” are substituted for AD and BC; given that every page has multiple dates, this leads to reader headache, having to focus to see which is which in a given case. No discussion at all is offered about weapons, even the most basic, although those are, short of hunting and gathering, the most critical elements to human survival in any pre-modern period, both for food acquisition and protection. We are constantly hectored that we must avoid creating global warming. The confusing plural “they” is always used as the generic pronoun. Lies are told to us that inventions like eyeglasses were made elsewhere than Europe. And so on, and on, and on.

If the author, Ryan North, had simply avoided the cant, the book would have been far better than it is. As it stands, so much of the book is irritating to the reader it substantially lessens his enjoyment in reading. Too bad.

[Atila Iamarino · Rating 5 out of 5]

Uma ótima forma de passar pela maioria das invenções da humanidade. Ryan North escreve o Dinosaur Comics e tem um ótimo humor que torna o livro muito leve. Com a desculpa de ser um guia para viajantes no tempo, o livro discute como podemos recriar as tecnologias e o conhecimento científico mais relevantes se tivéssemos que começar do zero. Ótima forma de edscobrir commo o mundo funciona. O único ponto negativo é que fui ler Dr. Stone depois e este livro acabou com a graça do mangá.

[Brian Clegg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Occasionally you read a book and think 'I wish I'd thought of that.' This was my immediate reaction to Ryan North's How to Invent Everything. The central conceit manages to be both funny and inspiring as a framework for writing an 'everything you ever wanted to know about everything (and particularly science)' book.

What How to Invent Everything claims to be is a manual for users of a time machine (from some point in the future). Specifically it's a manual for dealing with the situation of the time machine going wrong and stranding the user in the past. At first it appears that it's going to tell you how to fix the broken time machine - but then admits this is impossible. Since you're stuck in the past, you might as well make the best of your surroundings, so the aim of the rest of the book is to give you the knowledge you need to build your own civilisation from scratch.

We start with a fun flow chart for working out just how far back in time you are stuck (and what you will be faced with as challenges). From then on, there's a mix of practical information and background of theory that might help you rebuild some kind of civilised world. So we get science, technology, the arts, medicine - inevitably cherry picking but sometimes in a surprising amount of detail when focussed on a small part of what's needed.

In some ways, what we have here is a modern version of those popular books from a good few years ago that told you how to survive crocodile attacks and the like, but on steroids. Not only is this book far fatter (we're talking over 450 pages) it takes the premise of providing mostly accurate but practically useless how-to information to the wonderful extreme. Since the reader isn't actually stranded in the past, it's not going to be a truly practical guide, but it does put across a surprising amount of information in an approachable manner. It's like having the old Pear's Cylopedia crossed with a science fiction comedy.

The were only two things that slightly reduced the enjoyment. I found North's style of humour too knowing - it just got wearing after a while, rather than continuing to be entertaining as someone like Douglas Adams would have managed. So, for example, page after page of this kind of thing can get a bit heavy: 'Cool hats are easy to imagine [without language], but the meaning of the sentence "Three weeks from tomorrow, have your oldest stepsister meet me on the southeast corner two block east from the first house we egged last Halloween" is extremely difficult to nail down without having concrete words for the concepts of time, place, numbers, relationships and spooky holidays.'

My other slight moan is that the big sections on growing food and 'common human complaints that can be solved by technology' got a little samey and were distinctly over-long. Some aspects of establishing the needs of basic civilisation are... rather dull. But there was still much to delight in as the book skips its merry way from units of measurement to how to invent music (with a few classical pieces included to claim that you composed, because who's going to know you haven't).

The reality, then, doesn't quite live up to the brilliance of the idea. I'm not sure anything could. But it still remains a great way to link together a portmanteau of any random bits of knowledge that North felt it would be enjoyable to impart. It would make a great gift book and will give a lot of pleasure. You may even learn something handy, should you ever be stuck in the remote past.

[Nicky · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love the idea of books like this: here in one book, we’re going to impart to you the principles behind everything you need to know to rebuild all the comforts of home from nothing. This one has a fun gimmick: it’s been found embedded deep within rocks, and it claims to be the repair manual for a time machine. Since you can’t repair the time machine, instead here’s how to create the comforts of civilisation that you’re used to by accelerating technological progress. To that end, it has some flowcharts for figuring out what time period you’ve ended up in, and technology trees to help you trace out what you need to do to get particular results.

It’s also packed with information, which it delivers in a pretty light style, keeping to the basics. It’s all easy to understand, and the unfortunate thing is that for me the jovial tone got old. Yes, I know, we need XYZ invention to eventually have pizza. I get it. The pizza joke is old now!

The lists for me were kind of… I didn’t like dipping in and out, but it’s also not a great experience to just sit and read it all the way through, either. (For one thing, I think that’s why I got sick of the jokes.)

It’s a really fun gimmick, and there’s a lot of information in here and plenty to pique your curiosity, if a) you know a bit less about science than I do and b) you’re a dip-in-and-out sort of reader. I am just a curmudgeon.

[Meg C · Rating 5 out of 5]

Would you like to:
• Domesticate wolves in as little as 18 years?
• Play the Tetris theme on instruments you made yourself?
• Create a calorie surplus, therefore creating the opportunity of having a person or persons whose sole job is to put shoes on horses?

Well, have I got the book for you!

If I still haven't sold you, let me also mention:
• Upon its release, it was #1 on the non-fiction and science fiction bestseller lists.
• It has footnotes galore (and you know you love a good footnote).
• It has trig tables.
• It is 436 pages, but at the end I was sad there wasn't more to read.
• Reading how long it took civilization to develop some technologies will really make you feel better about your own failures.
• It's awesome.

[Lindsay · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's what it says on the cover: a guide for reinventing civilization from pretty much nothing, from moving from hunter-gatherer to farming, language and medicine, to rudimentary medicine and technology. All from the point of view of a time traveler stranded in the past with a manual provided by the manufacturers of the time machine that stranded them there.

While some of the detail is mind-numbing (although leavened by humor throughout), the exercise overall makes you think about the many underlying basic technologies that we all take for granted and really makes you appreciate just how much work it would require to recreate them all.

[Kusaimamekirai]

Ok, I’m just going to come out and say this is the coolest book ever invented. Emphasis on the “invention” part because that’s what Ryan North’s “How to Invent Everything” is all about.
Ever wonder how to make your own chemicals? (hint:in most cases don’t).
Your own penicillin? (not sure of the legality of selling your homemade penicillin or the wisdom of using it after the consequences of a few nights on the town but hey…there it is.).
Are you in the market for a backyard smelter to produce your own pig iron to make swords and other cool stuff? (and let’s face it, why wouldn’t you be?).
All this and so much more is in what might be the most useful and simultaneously useless survival guide ever.
But man….it is a lot of fun.
Perhaps my favorite chapter is the chapter on logic and philosophy. Or as he titles it:

“ MAJOR SCHOOLS OF PHILOSOPHY SUMMED UP IN A FEW QUIPPY SENTENCES ABOUT HIGH-FIVES”

Which is what it is. A list of philosophic principles wrapped around high fives. There are too many to list all of them but here are some particularly hilarious ones:

Monotheism: God gave me a high-five.

Monolatrism: There are definitely a bunch of gods, but I worship only the one who gave me a high-five.

Agnosticism: Maybe a god gave me a high-five, maybe I gave it to myself. Who is to say?

Autotheism: I gave myself a high-five. Also, I’m a god.

Absolutism: Certain actions are intrinsically right or wrong. For example, stealing, even to feed a starving puppy, ”might always be wrong, while high-fives, even if you keep accidentally slapping the person in the face real bad, might always be the correct course of action.

Dualism: There are good and bad forces in this world: for every high-five, there is a corresponding anti-high-five that is both down low and, sadly, too slow.

Solipsism: I gave myself a high-five. Unfortunately, I only imagined it, since nothing outside my own mind really exists.

Existentialism: Nothing, not even high-fives, has any meaning, so it’s up to the individual to give them whatever meaning they can by both handing out and receiving high-fives as authentically as possible.

Positivism: If you want me to believe in high-fives I’m going to need to see some scientific evidence.

Secular humanism: There are no gods to high-five us, but we can still be kind . . . and we can still high-five each other.

Epicureanism: Pleasure’s awesome, but the greatest pleasures are the absence of pain and fear, so I’m going to high only a sensible number of fives because I don’t want to end up with a hurt hand.

Absurdism: The sheer size, scope, and potential of things to understand about even one single high-five makes ever discovering the true meaning of high-fives impossible, and the only rational responses are suicide or blindly hoping there’s a god who could one day completely understand high-fives, or, failing either of those, accepting the absurdity of high-fives and, despite it all, still cheerily handing them out.

North makes us think about all the things we take for granted in our daily life and shows us how they were made, as well as when they were made. Many of these inventions seem incredibly obvious and yet took thousands of years before anyone thought about them (modern medicine is in fact just a little over a century old. 4 “humors” control the body? “Miasmas of smells are what make us sick? Come on man….) .
What makes this book even more enjoyable is he wraps each invention around the narrative of time travel. That’s right, you got stranded all the way back at the beginning of time, so what are you going to do? Start a new civilization of course. For which you’ll need agriculture, tools, music, mathematics, medicine, and a host of other tools. The best part being since you’re giving all this stuff to your new civilization, you can also take credit for all of it. Sweet! (North’s recommendation to “invent” Salt n’ Papa’s song “Shoop” as your first order of musical business however is inadvisable).
Basically it’s a cool guide to doing cool stuff that you don’t need to and probably shouldn’t make. (Such as caustic chemicals for example which as North points out: “Caustics have even been used to decompose organic tissues into a slurry, in an attempt to dispose of human bodies! If things are going well, you should not need to get rid of any human bodies.”).
But if you do find yourself rebuilding civilization somewhere (hopefully without the need to dispose of bodies because, what kind of civilization are you running there anyway??) this book is the first thing you’ll need to build a shining city on a hill. Or at least a hut from bamboo, mud and leaves.

[Leo Walsh · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this book off of NPR's best books of 2018 list and because I like reading science. The book makes it clear that science and technology matter. We humans as a species have advanced leaps and bounds beyond our natural state. So much of what we take for granted -- from spinning thread and creating looms to weave our cloth, to the agriculture which produces the food we eat, to even writing, reading and paper -- is based on decades of human experience, trial and error.

Okay. Fair enough. I love reading about this sort of thing. And North does a fair job of covering the major innovations that have gone into society. What's more, he's done a lot of clever research and following his basic diagrams and descriptions, you could produce a lot of important innovations from scratch... if you were to find yourself in a zombie apocalypse. Unlikely, but no doubt a bright young person would read this and try, for instance, making their own plowshare, or water turbine, etc.

I also like the historical perspective. Since the text makes it very clear that despite the "Western chauvinism" you here from semi-ignorant alt-right types these days, North makes it clear that through the 1700s, while Europeans were the laggards. We were dirty, poor and ill-read while places like China, India and North Africa had it all over on us. Those people created major innovations, like plows, saddles, water wheels, paper manufacturing and the like centuries before Europeans caught up.

But the thing is, North focuses on the HUMAN race. And we, together, have achieved much to be proud of.

So why only three stars?

Because the book uses a cloyingly cutesy literary device to draw readers in: this information is presented as if it's from a manual written for a stranded time traveler. And through the book. North adds "humorous" attempts that fell flat for this reader. From the NPR review, I expected humor on about the same level as THE HITCHHIKER"S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY, albeit in service of fact-based material. Instead, I got cloying sophomoric attempts at humor that brings to mind annoying shows about science that I don't like, the ADAM RUINS EVERYTHING.

Ah well, Perhaps North was going for a younger, middle school audience? And maybe I'm just the wrong audience? Who knows. But I do know if I taught 8th or 9th-grade history or social studies, I'd bring this book in as secondary reading to give students an appreciation for how important science really is.

But for literate adults, I find it ho-hum. Great information with a silly presentation that tries over-hard to be humorous. Three-stars.

[Trike · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a humorous way to sneakily introduce someone to the basics of science, history, prehistory, ecology, farming, technology, etc., via the framing device of being a how-to explainer for time-lost travelers. It is vastly entertaining, and I think you should buy it for any smart kids you know. (I just sent a copy to my 13-year-old cousin. I know he’s going to eat it up.)

Here’s a sample:

“Science gives you an explanation, but you can never say with absolute certainty that it’s the correct one. That’s why scientists talk about the theory of gravity (even though gravity clearly exists and can cause you to fall down the stairs), theories of climate change (even though it’s obvious our environment is not the same one our parents enjoyed, or that you’re enjoying right now), or the theory of time travel (even though it’s a fact that you’re clearly trapped in the past for reasons that can not have legal liability assigned).”

😆

Edit to add: my cousin texted me to say his son received it at 1 pm yesterday and he’s had his nose buried in it ever since. So there’s another endorsement.

[Jakub Slámka · Rating 5 out of 5]

Had a lot of fun with this book. Sort of a “Hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy” meets “Sapiens” :)

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely loved this book. It’s hilarious: every chapter starts with a pun (!! pause for dramatic effect), and the whole book is littered with jokes everywhere it was making me laugh out loud every 5 minutes. I love the premise, which is that you are a timetraveller who’s embarking on time travel with a potentially faulty time machine which might leave you stranded anywhere at any point in time (possibly even before the Big Bang). This book is a “manual” that teaches you how to reinvent civilization. In the author’s own words: “Reading this book has transferred knowledge of humanity's greatest achievements from the palm of your hand to the interior of your mind."

Why is that important? None of the knowledge we have today came free. It took so long for humanity to develop them. As an example, 98% of human history was spent without the written language. It was so difficult to invent written language from spoken ones, in fact, it only happened twice in the entire human civilization. After humans invented numbers and digits, it took us over 40 millennia to develop the rest of the number system, actually most of that just to invent fractions, the idea so basic that we now teach it to literal babies. And now we get to stand on the shoulders of giants who made humanity progress to this point and get a summary from one “manual”!

The book introduces major human inventions (both physical inventions and knowledge) like language, the number system, agriculture, food (e.g. how to make bread and beer), birth controls, steam engines, batteries, paper, logic, chemistry, astrophysics, philosophy, art, music, medicine, computers, and so much more! I personally love learning about things, or at least get a concept of them, so it was really cool.

I read another review that said “This books is sorta like ‘The Hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy’ meets ‘Sapiens’”. I couldn’t agree more. If you want a fun book where you can learn a bunch of things, pick it up now!

[Zach · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enjoyed this just as much the third time around.

[Pamela · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the funnest things I have ever read. It was nerdy, funny and I learned everything I need to know about all the things in the whole universe now so I’m pretty excited about that.

[Maddie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fun book about the science and technology that makes civilization possible, written as a manual for stranded time-travellers. It reminded me of The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Our World from Scratch in subject matter, but it was written in such an entertaining style that I enjoyed reading them both. Ryan North particularly enjoyed highlighting discoveries that were behind their time, where humans probably could have saved themselves a lot of hassle had someone thought to say, invent a better version of a plow or germ theory a few thousand years earlier.

Based on some of the reviews, I think some people were looking for a comprehensive survival manual, and this probably is not the perfect book for them. Some of the diagrams and instructions were a bit glossed over and a lot of pages were dedicated to humor, not science. This book was clearly written to be entertaining and informative, and I think it hit the mark perfectly.

[Lea · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a "guidebook on reinventing elements of modern civilization for a stranded time-traveller" . I thought the premise was fun and I loved it when I started, but I found it quite a difficult book to read from start to finish. The gimmick grew a little stale and then you are left with short bite-sized explanations of all kinds of stuff. And I love stuff! I'm genuinely fascinated by everything when you really dive into it. But since the chapters were all quite short and the explanations were superificial, they fell into two categories for me: a) too difficult to understand and follow - all the "how to build your own XYZ machine" fell into this category for me and b) I already know quite a lot about the topic and was irritiated by the way it was described. There's one page on philosophy that has a single line of jokey explanations for different philosophies all based around "high fiving", and while I thought some of them were funny, the one for consequentialism wasn't just mean-spirited, it was wrong.

So, yes, a somewhat fun book about all kinds of stuff, but it mostly served me as a reminder of what I don't know much about. More books on mechanics it is then.

[Denis Vasilev · Rating 4 out of 5]

Книжка как я любил в детстве - как устроено все на свете. Для меня оказалась интересной. Достаточно много рецептов цивилизации, про которые я думал что "знал", оказались неожиданными при практическом подходе

[Sean · Rating 4 out of 5]

If, like I have, you've ever played the game called "what technologies could you recreate if you traveled back in time, and why would soap be at the top of the list, and what is soap, anyway?" you'll enjoy this book. The conceit is that you're reading an emergency civilization-building guide for stranded time travelers; the guide covers everything from farming to cooking, hygiene to medicine, math to physics, chemistry to applied engineering, as so forth. Surprisingly thorough and well-constructed for a humorous, tongue-in-cheek guide. I saw some high-power lines the other day, and I could imagine how they linked up with the local transformers to provide electricity to the neighborhood. Before this book, that would've been a mystery. Very cool.

* A few silly shots fired in the name of our glorious culture wars, but don't let that put you off. Or maybe you'll like 'em, I don't know. Either way.

* Also, this guy seems to think that hamburgers call for egg, which makes me inexplicably angry. Egg goes in meatloaf, dude, but not hamburgers. If you're putting egg in hamburgers, you're doing it wrong. You're eating meatloaf sandwiches.

* As a long-time baker, I've often thought about this when I put a loaf in the oven: "This works because the yeast you've selected for are bred to feed on the sugars in your flour and water, and if there's oxygen around, they'll produce carbon dioxide as waste. This carbon dioxide is trapped by the gluten in your flour, where it causes your bread to rise. When you cook your dough, the yeast will happily keep gorging themselves in the food utopia you've given them, right up to the point where things become so hot that they all die as their entire colony is cooked to death. Congratulations! You have used the labor of microscope beasties to produce a more pleasant bread, then killed them the instant they were no longer useful. Millions of their corpses are baked into every slice of bread you eat."

* In the discussion of batteries, no mention of the Baghdad battery. Given how thorough the book is, I found this omission surprising.

[Kam Yung Soh · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun book that uses the premise of a time traveller stranded in the past and having the make the best of things by starting off humanity on the path of civilisation. The means of doing this is by bypassing the trial and errors that humanity went through and going straight to the solutions needed to set up a working modern civilisation.

The book starts off with tips of the stranded time traveller to find out where and when he might be. Assuming the traveller is lucky and ends up in a certain time period where modern man was around but civilisation hasn't been established yet, the book goes on with the basis of setting up a civilisation, namely getting a spoken and written language, a 'rational' system of numbers and establishing the scientific method.

Farming is then introduced so that people's basis calorie needs are satisfied and can devote energy to other matters. Units of measurements (length, weights, etc.) are added, followed by more details on how to farm more productively (selective breeding and crop rotation). A list of plants and animals that are useful are also given.

Once people can be properly fed, industry is then added. Basic farming technology is added (the plough and harness), followed by ways to preserve food. Mining machinery is added, leading to more machines and the beginnings of the industrial age all the way to electrical machines.

Other basic items of civilisation are introduced like clocks, thermometers, sewing, birth control, housing materials (cement and concrete), paper and transport (bicycles, boats, airplanes) are added. The basics of medicine and first aid are added and the book ends of 'luxuries' like music and the basics of computers.

With that, the stranded time traveller might be able to 'kick-start' humanity on the path of civilisation and end up where he or she started, with the abilities to build a time machine to go back in time.

[Sampurna Ray · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars for this funny, well-researched and handy survival guide for stranded time travelers. Recommended for readers who miss studying in school (secretly).

[Pratik Batavia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Premise of the book is simple. You, a time traveler, travels back in time but unfortunately your time machine breaks down in the journey. Now you don't know where you are and 'when' you are. Your last hope is this book which promises to empower you to not only survive but also thrive in this hopeless situation. Solution? Invent an entire civilization from ground up and all the technologies along with it.

As a Civilization and Age of empire fan, I was naturally enticed and intrigued by its premise. Always wanted to learn which all different ages human civilizations went through; how and when did techonlogical advancement happen and oh boy! What a treat it was to read! Simply the best book I read in 2019. It teaches you how to conquer a simple fire to electricity, harness salt to nuclear energy, build simple t-shirt buttons to computers, from measuring temperatures to deriving longitudes and latitudes by simply looking at the sun. If you are interested in how everything you see around you was invented and how can everything be reinvented, this book is for you. If you want to learn that in "non boring, laughing all the way" way, this book is for you. Filled with fun facts-stories and witty (and sometimes downright stupid!) humorous quid bits, this book is sure to leave you wanting for more and at the very least ignites curiosity and interest towards our seemingly stale world.

[Ric · Rating 3 out of 5]

When reading this, I couldn’t help but think of What If? by Randall Munroe, because it’s a similar kind of book except it’s written in a very different way and it’s way more practical. Instead of answering hypothetical questions, it was a guidebook for someone who wants to restart society when stuck in the past. It was full of quips and one-liners that made me laugh out loud. My favorite running gag was that any quote mentioned in the book was credited to “you” (originally ‘the name of the person who actually said it’) because technically if you go back in time and say a quote that you heard but it hasn’t been said yet, you originally said it (it’s a paradox!). Admittedly, it was probably closer to 3.5 stars because I did enjoy it, but it could be really dry in parts. If there’s some apocalyptic event, I know one of the books I’ll be grabbing when I leave the house.

[Paperclippe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brah.

You know I love a footnote.

This book is like if all of the bottoms of all of the pages of Squirrel Girl got together and wrote their own book, and I am so desperately here for it. I'm a disgusting know-it-all, and I paused more than a dozen times to interrupt my partner and read something out loud that neither of us knew. I almost wish I were stranded in time just so I could "invent" some things, but just learning how all the things I use every day actually work (or in some cases, don't work) was definitely worth this wild space-time ride.

[Lance L · Rating 2 out of 5]

It started great and at first I was amused, but it quickly wore out its welcome and became a sort of one-note conceit built on an increasingly unfunny joke. The conceit is that it is a survival manual for a time machine, with all kinds of snarky instructions for rebuilding society. How that plays out in reality is a wise-ass all-knowing narrator cracking easy jokes over a series of wikipedia pages.

[Tanner · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you've ever played Civ and thought, gosh, it would really be quite interesting enough if it was just the technology tree, this is the book for you. Pretty funny too, if a little more repetitive than when North gets to play with characters.