Nilesh Jasani's Reviews > The Invention of Yesterday: A 50,000-Year History of Human Culture, Conflict, and Connection

Big History books sacrifice details for detailed discussions on broad across-era trends. Mr. Ansary's fast history book does an excellent job describing the important historic events through headlines and the quickest of summaries but is wanting in sufficient discussions on underlying themes.

On the positive side, the author does an excellent job culling the list. Extremely few history-defining events miss a mention. The summaries are light even for a big history book that is supposed to cover all eras, all regions, and all events, but the book's seamless and lucid account more than makes up for it.

The biggest drawback is the author's desire for a linear historic arc. There is no real-life messiness in the way humanity's story is presented. The author spends absolutely no time discussing what could have been or alternate roads missed. There is a needless inevitability as the author refuses to strongly critic any event or development except the most obviously heinous.

The story arc presented has a handful of obvious themes, but none radical. The author makes no real attempt to present any novel ideas, which would be most jarring for readers who have read other big history works.

The book ends up being little more than a source of quick summaries on hundreds of topics by avoiding anything too contentious. And to be fair, everyone is likely to walk away with a few new information bits from these well-written briefs. Overall, the book will be most valuable for those picking it as their first Big History read.