However, he was momentarily daunted by the prospect of writing a major book on all of science, and he delayed signing the contract until 15 July, after receiving encouragement from his friend (and future wife) Janet Jeppson.

[2] The book's title was Svirsky's, chosen as a deliberate homage to George Bernard Shaw's The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism and Capitalism (1928).

[4] In organizing the various fields of science, Asimov chose to begin with the universe as a whole and work inward in narrowing circles until he was inside the brain at the end.

[3] Asimov began work on the book on 2 October, and found that he had no trouble with it at all, writing anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 words a day without any sense of strain.

[7] At that point, Asimov was only two chapters shy of finishing the book, but saw no reason to complete it if it would be subjected to such radical abridgment, and halted work.

[15] Pfeiffer wrote that Asimov tried to discuss too many aspects of science in the limited space available to him and compressed material "to a point where the result is almost a listing of developments with inadequate transitions in between".

He concluded that Asimov had "prepared a good introduction to modern research" that "would have been better if he had allowed himself more space for the unique, imaginative writing of which he is so obviously capable."

The Intelligent Man's Guide to Science was nominated for a National Book Award in the nonfiction category, losing to the journalist William L. Shirer's The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (1960).

[19] McFadden considered the book enjoyable to read, and praised Asimov for presenting new information "from dinosaurs to robots, the solar system to new physics discoveries".