"Strathern does an excellent job revitalizing the drama of chemistry's volatile mix of ideas and substances. His readable romp through the annals of chemistry conveys a remarkable amount of information about science in general." --Sunday Times
"Chemistry has been a neglected area of science writing, and Mendeleyev, the king of chemistry, is a largely forgotten genius. Strathern's history goes a long way toward correcting that injustice." --Simon Singh, Sunday Telegraph, author of The Code Book and Fermat's Last Theorem
"In its pages there are more asides, anecdotes, ammunition for pub quizzes, personal information about alchemists, scientists, chemists, and charlatans, and touches of humor than the reader has a right to expect." --The Scotsman
"Strathern is an entertaining guide, too, capably marshaling a colorful cast of thinkers and experimentalists...Beguiling." --New Scientist
"[A] wonderful historical romp through mankind's attempts to understand the constituents of matter...a witty, complexity-free confection that makes nonsense of the idea-we need to make our science books more demanding and headache-inducing." --The Observer
"An earthly, rambunctious romp through the history of chemistry." --The Independent
