Sheinkin decides to end the epilogue of his book with a real eye-opener:
In the end, this is a difficult story to sum up. The making of the atomic bomb is one of history's most amazing examples of teamwork and genius and poise under pressure. But it's also the story of how humans created a weapon capable of wiping our species off the planet. It's a story with no end in sight.
And, like it or not, you're in it.
Here you were, happily reading along, thinking this was just some history, and then—boom—you realize that everything you just read about has really happened, and has very real, very serious ramifications to this day. Whoa.
The ending is a wake-up call, demanding readers realize that even though the people in the story have been dead for quite some time, the things they did have far-reaching consequences. Maybe it makes you think a bit about the fragility of human life. Maybe it makes you think about the evils that humans are capable of creating. Maybe it makes you want ice cream. We don't know, but we like it.