Picking up the theme of his bestselling Connections and utilizing cross-chapter
margin references that imitate computer hypertext, Burke investigates the dynamic
interplay of scientific discovery, technological innovation and social change in
a dizzying, mind-expanding adventure that explores the crosscurrents of history.
One chapter follows a trail from slavery in America to English Quaker abolitionist
Sampson Lloyd's nail-making business to German-American immigrant engineer John
Roebling's wire suspension bridges (including the Brooklyn Bridge) to rustproofing
with cadmium to nuclear reactors. Accident, luck, greed, ambition and mistakes
abound as Scientific American columnist Burke tries to demonstrate the inter-
connectedness of all things. Another typical chapter unravels the serendipitous
interactions among Cyrus Dalkin's invention of carbon paper, Edison's telephone
(which used sooty carbon black in the transmitter), the rise of suburbs, X-ray
crystallography and DNA. Often as maddening as a pinball game, this nevertheless
unique and exciting odyssey may change the way you look at the world.

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