THE IDEA FACTORY Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation

Bell Labs was the incubator for the scientific innovations that shaped one of today's vital components of daily life—worldwide telephone service. AT&T gave birth to Bell Labs in the 1920s. In his narration, Chris Sorensen is clearly enamored with the work environment that nurtured so many creative concepts and inventions. However, Gertner's book deals more with the ingenious collaborations of the people involved than with the details of technical triumphs. Nonetheless, Sorensen's pacing lags between sentences: He pauses as though the listener is expected to contemplate complex formulas and leaps of cognition. But there’s no need to ponder those pioneers' fully lucid scientific experiments or their accomplishments and treacheries. As a result, the listener—itching to know what's coming next—becomes becomes impatient for Sorensen to get on with it. A.W. © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine [Published: JUNE 2012]