Stephen Hawking: A Quest For The Theory Of Everything [Mass Market Paperback]

Kitty Ferguson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 1992

A biography of one of the most remarkable figures in theoretical physics since Einstein describes Hawking's childhood, Cambridge days, and battle with his illness and discusses his theories. Reprint. AB. K.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Bantam (July 1, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 055329895X
• ISBN-13: 978-0553298956
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 0.4 x 6.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,538,933 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #50 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Professionals & Academics > Scientists

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Excellent... at deceiving, June 30, 2006

By 

Becoming a scientist - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stephen Hawking: A Quest For The Theory Of Everything (Mass Market Paperback)

I felt that Ferguson achieved a nice balance by intermingling Hawking's biography with introduction to his theories. It allows your brain to alternate between working on science and returning "back to earth" to meet an interesting human being with all his problems and victories. The science part is very layman-friendly, and at the same time is not too slow for the scientifically-minded (just a bit too politically correct, but it's understandable). The biography part is tactful, and with just the right amount of detail. The book is clear and inspiring, and she convinced me to read Hawking's "A brief history of time".

Strangely enough, Hawking's book turned out to be not as clear and inspiring as Ferguson's book. She painted him as the king of clarity, conciseness, and humor, but I don't get such an impression at all from reading his book. So now I have mixed feelings: I respect Ferguson for being good at writing and teaching (better than Hawking at both), but I'm annoyed with her for the false advertisement.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars One star for the book + the star that is Hawking, June 5, 2003

By 

anybody else or "amanuet" (Orbis Tertius) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stephen Hawking: A Quest For The Theory Of Everything (Mass Market Paperback)

After reading "A Brief History Of Time" by Stephen Hawking, I was absolutely taken with astrophysics. Now, I'm no professional, but I could understand Hawking's book even if I had to learn to concentrate on what I was reading completely and reread some places. Hawking attempted to explain even the most complicated things - and succeeded. I thought I could pick up Kitty Ferguson's book for some easy reading on Hawking's discoveries - boy, was I wrong!

Kitty Ferguson makes absolutely no attempt to explain the things she's talking about. None! She simply gives you facts that are impossible to accept without explanations. For the most part, I did know what she was talking about - and even then I was astounded by how confusing she had managed to make it all seem, and how imprecise a few of her facts and analogies were.

If you understand the things she's talking about (and you probably do understand most of the things if you know at least something about Hawking's discoveries), you have no need to read this book. It's not even that good of a biography. If you don't know a thing about astrophysics, but would like to learn and, what's much more important, understand these things, pick up another book - and I myself would suggest the aforementioned "A Brief History Of Time" by Stephen Hawking.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Interesting if you understand it already, April 20, 2005

By 

Snowman (Michigan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stephen Hawking: A Quest For The Theory Of Everything (Mass Market Paperback)

After reading A Brief History of Time I decided that I wanted to learn more about Stephen Hawkings himself and how he became who he is today. I picked up this book written by Kitty Ferguson, which is claimed to be a biography and started reading it. After about twenty pages she was done talking about his life and started talking about his theories. This was disappointing to me because I thought the book was a biography.

As I continued reading I became somewhat confused while she told about Hawkings discoveries. The explanations were little or none in trying to get the reader to understand the ideas. It did not help that there were very few small illustrations that were in the book to go along with her explanations. If there were highly detailed color illustrations such as those in A Brief History In Time, it might have been much easier to understand.

I did enjoy the beginning of the book where Kitty goes into detail about the beginning of Hawkings life but I feel like it was just an overview of how he became who he is today. I would not recommend this book, instead I would recommend A Brief History In Time because it is much easier to understand because it has great illustrations and is not so mathematical.