Across a huge range of endeavour, 1859 was the year of mega change. At the beginning of that year Charles Darwin was writing The Origin of Species. By year's end, other people, discoveries and inventions had changed the world forever, and society was converging in a global culture. It was a different world back then, a changing world, a shrinking world. Mr Darwin's Incredible Shrinking World is an entertaining book by leading science writer Peter Macinnis and it tells the story of how it all came about.