Author(s): Ed Conway

History | Politics | Technology

Sand, salt, iron, copper, oil and lithium. They built our world, and they will transform our future. These are the six most crucial substances in human history. They took us from the Dark Ages to the present day. They power our computers and phones, build our homes and offices, and create life-saving medicines. But most of us take them completely for granted.

In Material World, Ed Conway travels the globe - from the sweltering depths of the deepest mine in Europe, to spotless silicon chip factories in Taiwan, to the eerie green pools where lithium originates - to uncover a secret world we rarely see. Revealing the true marvel of these substances, he follows the mind-boggling journeys, miraculous processes and little-known companies that turn the raw materials we all need into products of astonishing complexity.

As we wrestle with climate change, energy crises and the threat of new global conflict, Conway shows why these substances matter more than ever before, and how the hidden battle to control them will shape our geopolitical future. This is the story of human civilisation from a new perspective - our ambitions and glory, innovations and appetites - literally from the ground up.

Ed Conway - Sky Economics Editor and Times columnist - reveals a bold new story of human progress told through six materials that built our world, for fans of Tim Marshall, Lewis Dartnell, Jared Diamond and Yuval Harari.

'A compelling narrative of the human story' Tim Marshall, author of Prisoners of Geography

Review: 
Lively, rich and exciting ... full of surprises. Underlines that to understand global geopolitics, you need to understand natural resources and geology -- Peter Frankopan, author of THE SILK ROADS
Expansive, erudite, and edifying. A stunning insight into the materials that shaped our history and built the modern world -- Prof. Lewis Dartnell, author of 'BEING HUMAN: How our Biology shaped World History'
[An] enlightening account... he throws new light on how the world works... Not a sentence jars in Material World * The Times *
Fascinating, fun, and vitally important. A wonderful exploration of the world we've built yet somehow manage to ignore -- Tim Harford, bestselling author of HOW TO MAKE THE WORLD ADD UP
A stunning book that will transform the way you think about economics and life. Brilliantly written -- Matthew Syed, author of REBEL IDEAS
Brilliant -- Martin Wolf * Financial Times - Best summer books of 2023: Economics *
In Material World, Ed Conway uncovers the hidden history of the materials that structure our world. Full of colourful characters and fascinating connections, Material World shows how the seemingly simplest materials - from sand to salt to iron - require unbelievably complex refining and processing before arriving at their final form. Absorbing storytelling... Fascinating and insightful -- Chris Miller, author of CHIP WAR
Conway's gripping explanation of a world you didn't know needed explaining deserves this highest of accolades: Material World, once read, leaves us baffled that nobody ever thought of writing it before -- Matthew Parris
Endlessly fascinating -- Adrian Chiles
Ed Conway is a great thinker... Material World is an engrossing study of the basic substances on which we all depend. Anyone who cares about the resources which built our world and where mankind is heading must read this vital book -- Adam Boulton, Times Radio

Author Biography: Ed Conway is a writer and broadcaster. He is the Economics and Data Editor of Sky News and a regular columnist for The Times and Sunday Times. He has written two critically acclaimed and bestselling books and has won numerous awards for his journalism. He lives in London.