Took three tries, but this time I read it straight through. It is magnificent. A tour de force. Challenging, difficult and incredible.

I highly recommend accompanying the book with the Great Lectures series, and if you really want a treat, also buy the "whisper sync" version for your Kindle, and read along as it is read to you.

The last chapter is unbelievable, the perfect ending to this extraordinary book. The chapter on child birth is perhaps my favorite: he recreates the pregnancy term, by starting the chapter in Elizabethan English and slowly, gradually advancing to modern English. Brilliant.

All in all, I can't recommend this book highly enough.