Smarter by Sunday: 52 Weekends of Essential Knowledge for the Curious Mind

Today’s post is on Smarter by Sunday: 52 Weekends of Essential Knowledge for the Curious Mind by The New York Times. It is 500 pages long including an index. The cover is white with an apple cut into sections on it. The intended reader is someone who is very curious. There is no language, no sex, and no violence in this book. Because of the complex themes teens and adults would get the most out of this book. The chapters are told in third person. There Be Spoilers Ahead.

From the dust jacket- Fell asleep during history class in high school when World War II was covered? Don’t know much about William Shakespeare? Always wondered who really invented the World Wide Web? Here is the book for you, with all the answers you’re been looking for: The New York Times Presents Smarter by Sunday is based on the premise that there is a recognizable group of topics in history, literature, science, art, religion, philosophy and music that educated people should be familiar with today. Over one hundred of these have been identified and arranged in a way that they can be studied over a year’s time by spending two hours a weekend. Each weekend covers a single, larger topic and is divided into two days. Each daily entry consisted of 1,500-2,00 words on related subjects.
Sample topics include:

·         The Big Bang, stars, and galaxies

·         The French Revolution

·         The Bible

·         China

·         The Internet

·         The American Civil War

·         Rome

·         The Renaissance

·         American writers

·         Modern medicine

·         Genetics

·         Global warming

·         Philosophy

·         Nuclear weapons

·         American popular music

·         Nineteenth-century painting

And many others. Smarter by Sunday is perfect one-year crash course during which the reader will cover a wide range of subjects to attain a solid level of knowledge and a well-balance understanding of the world.

Review- This was an interesting read. I did not know so much about many of the topics and now I think that I could at the very least follow someone who knows a lot about them. The writing is very readable. It is for the general person who just wants to know more about a topic to pick up and read. This would a great book to start with if you are looking for a nonfiction subject to learn more about. It gives you a little bit of everything; like it says on the jacket. I liked that it give a good grounding in all the topics without overwhelming the reader. I have a very curious mind and I have some new topics that I am going to have to read up on. Like women painters in the 19^th century. I hope that the New York Times does another book like this one because there is just so much to learn that they did not cover enough for me.

I give this book a Five out if Five stars. I get nothing for my review and I borrowed this book from my local library.