How Things Work: The Facts Visually Explained

Posted: April 30, 2019

The How Things Work series of books endeavors to use charts, infographics, and colorful illustrations to teach us the meaning of life.

Nah, just kidding. True to their name, they single out a bunch of things we create and study, and tell us how they work.

Depending on your interests, and where you might have a hole or two in your knowledge, How Things Work can provide an enriching overview of an array of disciplines, both concrete and more abstract. For example, you can learn the facts about technology, whose inner workings are grounded in math and science, or the facts about money, a concept that's not only complex, but also pretty much entirely made up.

With Father's Day coming up, sounds like a no-fail Dad gift to me.

How Money Works: The Facts Visually Explained

How Money Works breaks down key financial concepts into some fine-looking infographics and jargon-free text that, when all is said and done, still don't make me feel better about my own earnings, savings, and retirement situation.

Some topics covered include how governments control money, how companies make money, how financial markets work, and how individuals (who aren't me) can maximize income through investments. If you're still confused about Bitcoin & Co., How Money Works could also be the pretty picture that finally make cryptocurrency click for you.

$13.53 ➠ Amazon

How Technology Works: The Facts Visually Explained

Smart watches, self-driving cars, and can openers. Yep, you'll get rundowns of them all in How Technology Works. This edition of The Facts Visually Explained is the newest in the How line, and is up to date with all the tech goodies that keep our world turning...and contribute to its downward spiral.

Cheer up, though, How Technology Works also discusses inventions that could save us, such as solar cells and new methods of farming that may be able to feed the billions of obnoxious replicas we keep making of ourselves.

$14.71 ➠ Amazon

How Business Works: The Facts Visually Explained

Ugh, I need this one. How to calculate depreciation? Forecasting future performance? Effective marketing? I thought starting and running a business would teach me such things along the way but, 7 years in, that just doesn't seem to be the case.

$18.08 ➠ Amazon

How the Body Works: The Facts Simply Explained

I definitely remember studying how the body works in junior high and high school, but what I learned and retained...uh...now I know what "Your epidermis is showing" means.

How the Body Works covers the senses, how we read faces and body language, nutrition and immunity, the brain, sleep, memory, and dreams amongst other topics. Chapters are divided into biological systems.

$8.46 ➠ Amazon

How Science Works: The Facts Visually Explained

How Science Works? All of it? Seems like a big area to tackle in a hundred pages of infographics. I think we're mostly getting buzzy pop culture topics here. How airplanes stay in the air, how ants are so strong, whether or not artificial intelligence will take over the world.

And on the side, genes, Higgs boson, and black holes.

$13.52 ➠ Amazon

How Food Works: The Facts Visually Explained

They call How Food Works "a nutritionist in a book" that breaks down why the things we eat are good or bad for us. Yikes. Don't think we'll hear any pleasant news here.

Topics include dieting, gluten intolerance, "sell-by" dates, what superfoods do to the body, and why it's dangerous to reheat rice.

Wait, what?! It's dangerous to reheat rice? Is that why I'm growing this third nipple?!

$13.52 ➠ Amazon

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