Shrinking the World is the story of a revolution: how technology has shaped the way we communicate, think and live.

The first email was sent less than four decades ago; by 2011 there will be 3.2 billion people using email. But as our addiction to email mounts, has our time for leisure and contemplation diminished? We may be more connected, but are we more isolated?

Shrinking the World explores how various technologies-the telegram, newspapers, railway networks and, yes, email-have changed everything, from the nature of military intelligence to the way we compose a love letter.

If you check your email in bed, mid-conversation, or at the dinner table; if you share three meals a day with your computer, Shrinking the World will make you shutdown, switch off and reconnect.

'Impeccably researched, eloquently argued.' Geraldine Brooks