[4][5] In the preface, de Camp states that the book's goal is to "tell the story of the Scopes evolution trial of 1925, at Dayton, Tennessee, as truthfully as possible.

These include historical examples of conflict between religion and science, such as selections from Darwin's Origin of Species and the Inquisition's Condemnation of Galileo, as well as more poetic statements on human nature from Shakespeare and Lewis Carroll.

[10] Several reviewers have commended the book for providing a factual and unbiased portrayal of the full story of the trial, as opposed to the fictionalized Inherit the Wind or the one-sided H.L.

[13] Kirtley Mathers, one of the scientists who testified for the defense in the Scopes Trial, spoke highly of the book in a review that appeared in Science.

[14] The Scopes Trial was also the subject of a chapter in Darwin and His Great Discovery, written by the author in collaboration with his wife Catherine Crook de Camp and published in 1972.