The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table

Published in 2010, New York Times bestseller The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements, by science writer Sam Kean, tells the story of the atomic elements that make up the Earth and everything else in the universe. Kean describes how they were discovered and the unique and often strange properties they possess. He also tells intriguing and sometimes heartbreaking stories of the hardworking scientists who uncovered the mysteries of atoms. The author also relates how, across decades of struggle, researchers manage to make sense of the fundamental particles and arrange them into science’s most basic reference chart, the periodic table of the elements.

From Plato’s early surmises about the nature of atoms to Glenn Seaborg’s carefully arranged modern periodic table of the 1960s, the story of the elements is filled with drama, humor, triumph, tears, and even death.

Marie Curie discovered and experimented with radioactive materials, won two Nobel Prizes for her efforts, and succumbed to cancer from radiation. Luis Alvarez found iridium where it doesn’t belong and deduced that the dinosaurs died from a giant space rock.