How to Invent Everything: A Survival Guide for the Stranded Time Traveler

Ryan North

Sep 2018 · Penguin Random House Audio · Narrated by Ryan North

About this audiobook

An NPR Best Book of 2018

"How to Invent Everything is such a cool book. It's essential reading for anyone who needs to duplicate an industrial civilization quickly." --Randall Munroe, xkcd creator and New York Times-bestselling author of What If?

The only book you need if you're going back in time

What would you do if a time machine hurled you thousands of years into the past. . . and then broke? How would you survive? Could you improve on humanity's original timeline? And how hard would it be to domesticate a giant wombat?

With this book as your guide, you'll survive--and thrive--in any period in Earth's history. Bestselling author and time-travel enthusiast Ryan North shows you how to invent all the modern conveniences we take for granted--from first principles. This illustrated manual contains all the science, engineering, art, philosophy, facts, and figures required for even the most clueless time traveler to build a civilization from the ground up. Deeply researched, irreverent, and significantly more fun than being eaten by a saber-toothed tiger, How to Invent Everything will make you smarter, more competent, and completely prepared to become the most important and influential person ever. You're about to make history. . . better.

Ratings and reviews

Having picked this book up since I wanted something to listen to at work I've enjoyed every minute of it. While it may be a bit dry if you choose to listen to many hours at once the knowledge within is utterly fascinating and will change the way you look at everyday life. Everything from how to make pottery and efficient farming methods to electrical devices and rebuilding the metric system is explained in satisfying and comedic detail. This is one I'm sure to come back to time and time again.

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About the author

Ryan North is the New York Times-bestselling author of Romeo and/or Juliet and To Be or Not To Be. He's the creator of Dinosaur Comics and the Eisner Award-winning writer of Adventure Time, Jughead, and The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl for Marvel Comics, and he has a master's in computational linguistics from the University of Toronto. Ryan lives in Toronto with his wife, Jenn, and their dog, Noam Chompsky.