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A Short History of Private Life
by Bill Bryson
"Houses aren't refuges from history. They are where history ends up."
Bill Bryson and his family live in a Victorian parsonage in a part of England where nothing of any great significance has happened since the Romans decamped. Yet one day, he began to consider how very little he knew about the ordinary things of life as he found it in that comfortable home. To remedy this, he formed the idea of journeying about his house from room to room to "write a history of the world without leaving home."
The bathroom provides the occasion for a history of hygiene; the bedroom, sex, death, and sleep; the kitchen, nutrition and the spice trade; and so on, as Bryson shows how each has figured in the evolution of private life. Whatever happens in the world, he demonstrates, ends up in our house, in the paint and the pipes and the pillows and every item of furniture.
Bill Bryson has one of the liveliest, most inquisitive minds on the planet, and he is a master at turning the seemingly isolated or mundane fact into an occasion for the most diverting exposition imaginable. His wit and sheer prose fluency make At Home one of the most entertaining books ever written about private life.
What are you reading this week? And what did you think of last week’s books? (1/15/2026)
Last week read an old one- The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson and couldn't stop laughing! Almost finished with Backman's My Friends and was hoping for another Beartown but finding the characters insufferable. Starting Canticle by Janet Edwards about a medieval woman who lear...
-Barbette_T
"Starred Review...a delightful stroll through the history of domestic life. Now living in a 19th-century church rectory in Norfolk, England, the author decided to learn about the ordinary things of life by exploring each room in his house.... In a sense, Bryson's book is a history of 'getting comfortable slowly'.... Informative, readable and great fun." - Kirkus
"Starred Review. In demonstrating how everything we take for granted... went from unimaginable luxury to humdrum routine, Bryson shows us how odd and improbable our own lives really are." - Publishers Weekly
"Its eclectic, ambulatory arrangement will delight many but baffle others. Bryson fans will want to read it." - Library Journal
This information about At Home was first featured
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo © Bath & North East Somerset Council
Bill Bryson was born in Des Moines, Iowa. He moved to England, where he worked for The Times and The Independent, and wrote for many major British and American publications.
Bill Bryson's bestselling books include A Walk in the Woods, Notes From a Small Island, In a Sunburned Country, Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words, A Short of History of Nearly Everything, which earned him the 2004 Aventis Prize, and The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid. He was chancellor of Durham University, England's third oldest university, from 2005 to 2011, and is an honorary fellow of Britain's Royal Society. Bryson lives in England with his wife and children.
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