This book itself is marvellous proof that the prospect of ruins can elicit the finest cadences of the language, whereby a languorous and clamant prose is drawn out of the spectacle of desuetude and decay-In Ruins is a rich and absorbing volume

Woodward ravishes the reader with the sudden twists and turns of his elegant narrative as it moves in whatever direction he wishes it to go-Woodward's infectious enthusiasm for his subject will send his readers in many new directions

Christopher Woodward's paean of praise to the ruin fizzes with felicitous detail, anecdote, literary reference and art history-An enchanting and informative voyage

An enchanting kaleidoscope of ruins from all times, cultures, and places, is full of stimulating juxtapositions

The research is exhaustive... It would be hard to imagine a more thorough examination of any comparable historical issue... Weir is to be congratulated on her impartiality and sound judgement

The method is to amass a dazzling number of facts and findings from disparate sources...riveting...arguing with Bryson is part of the enjoyment of reading him, and accompanying him across swathes of layered history.

By rummaging down the back of the nation's sofa, Bryson has come up with a light-hearted and endlessly fascinating story...What you want from him is his wry humour and ability to raise a quizzical eyebrow at the sheer oddness of the human race.

Bryson hoards facts. He can't resist a well-turned story...An idiosyncratic sweep through the makings of modernity.

At Home takes us on a tour not merely of Bryson's house but of the amazingly well-stocked mind of a man who can see a world in a grain of sand. He addresses his readers as if they were welcome visitors to his home whom he is eager both to inform and to entertain; he is a guide of inexhaustible patience, good humour, and irresistible enthusiasm.

Entertaining, fact-packed...He is a cheery,idiosyncratic guide, eclectic rather than scholarly, a true populariser. At Home will have every reader eyeing home rather differently.

By now, Bryson is certainly famous enough to have got away with a a far less bulging compendium. Instead, on our behalf, he's been through those hundreds of books (508 according to the bibliography)....He's then extracted their most arresting material and turned the result into a book that, for all its winning randomness, is not just hugely readable but a genuine pageturner...None of these things, needless to say, are as easy as Bryson in his ever-genial way makes them seem.

Effortlessly digestible prose, wry self-deprecating humour and lightly-worn erudition...everyone will find something to surprise them.

Join this amiable tour guide as he wanders through his house...it takes a very particular kind of thoughtfulness, as well as a bold temperament, to stuff all this research into a mattress that's supportive enough to loll about on while pondering the real subject of this book- the development of the modern world....Bryson's enthusiasm brightens any dull corner. I recommend that you hand over control and simply enjoy the ride. You'll be given a delightful smattering of information about everything but, weirdly, the kitchen sink.

For blockbuster Bill Bryson, no subject is too vast...So he could write a history of the world without leaving home. And very genially and quirkily he does...His theme is how nowadays we take home comfort for granted, but how recently we obtained it...he is very good company indeed.

Delightful...Considering our homes means a dash through history, politics, science, sex, and dozens of other fields. If this book doesn't supply you with five years' worth of dinner conversation, you're not paying attention.

Compelling, quirky and wonderfully original.

Immensely readable.

Aaronovitch aims to do more than expose popular nonsense

Forensically intelligent and hugely enjoyable study of modern conspiracy theories...consistently reasonable, persuasive and humane

Solid, well-researched and unexpectedly gripping

[Aaronovitch] is, broadly speaking, an enemy of conspiracy theories. He is also articulate, well versed in the facts and a good writer

Aaronovitch painstakingly dissects these and some of the other great conspiracy theories of the age and demonstrates with merciless clarity what utter tripe they are.

A serious, entertaining and shocking investigation into the stuff that conspiracy theories are made of. Aaronovitch guides us through the half-truths and speculation and examines the distrust of officialdom which fuels conspiracists' imagination.

In its many-layered discoveries, the book is truly magnetic