A brief discussion of 102 basic chemical elements introduces a more detailed account of the structure, forms, and uses of the most common elements. In this book, which was periodically revised and updated, Isaac Asimov has chosen to call all the chemical elements so far discovered "building blocks of the universe," and shows why they are just that.

He discusses some of the elements separately, some of them in groups, according to their importance, tells us how they were discovered, who discovered them, how they got their names, what their uses are, and, in some cases, what their dangers are. The book is full of interesting anecdotes and sidelights which help make the subject of chemistry, and its allied sciences, an endlessly fascinating one-even for those who are not chemistry students but who are interested in the world around them.

Isaac Asimov knows how to write about science for young people and provides a clear, up-to-date approach to the "building blocks of the universe."