A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking

After a fiction streak, I desperately needed to move onto something nonfiction. For this, I picked perhaps one of the most renowned nonfiction works of our time. Now, I have read parts of this book before and—based on the select passages I read—was eager to read the book in its entirety. However, after completely reading Hawking’s brief history, I admit I was a little let down. Even though he is the smartest man alive (it is rare that I can say that without any sarcasm), I think there are a number of astronomy and physics textbooks that do a better job explaining the universe. Then again, the book is titled a “brief” history, making it difficult to fully develop some core principals of physics. This book does offer the unique perspective in that it was written by Stephen Hawking. Any other book on these topics may mention that Stephen proved item A. However, in this book Hawking actually can say, “So I was going to the bathroom when I realized item A.” The personal stories add so much. Actually, his personal stories would be the only reason I’d recommend this book, especially his story about betting some Penthouse magazines over the existence of black holes. I don’t know about you, but I can’t help but laugh when I think of Stephen Hawking going to a convenience store (or smut shop) to buy some porn.

Date Completed: January 27, 2007