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One of my bookish resolutions for the last year was to read more non-fiction books, and since I’m a science girl, I mainly thought of authors like Isaac Asimov or Stephen Hawking, who have done a great job by explaining science concepts to the general public. I saw this autobiography of the latter on Netgalley and I thought that it would be a great chance to get to know him better.
In My brief History, Hawking tells us the story of his life from the very beginning, since he was a little boy, and ends up explaining briefly – everything in this book is brief – how he came to the conclusions and equations of the physics of the Universe. He also talks about his books and his illness, which I thought he suffered from when he was a kid, but in fact it was developed when he was twenty-something, and how his personal life was affected since then, but curiously not his professional life.
What I liked most is how he explains the way scientists work and science is carried out. People like to imagine a crazy old man who spends his entire life alone in a laboratory until something is discovered, more or less by chance; but reality is quite different. Hawking says something in the book like “I had an eureka moment and then I spent X years working with these colleagues until we got to know the theory of the black holes”, so everybody can notice thanks to this book that you actually need to work very hard, and usually with a group of people, and also that science doesn’t happen by chance; sometimes that eureka moment came just by asking yourself the right question.
I recommend this book to those who are interested in science and how it is developed, as well as to the readers who want to know more about Stephen Hawking, of course. The book is very short; he could have talked longer about his work and his illness, but it’s a summary and he actually covers all the aspects of his life that we are curious about.
PS: I don’t want to rate non-fiction books, for the moment.
My brief history Stephen Hawking Publisher: Bantam ISBN: 0345535286 Hardcover, 144 pages
From Isi 
First of all, HAPPY NEW YEAR Isi! *Ahem* This sounds like a really absorbing book. There’s no doubt that Hawking is one of the key thinkers of our time and, since I don’t think it’s likely that I’ll be getting through A Brief History of Time at any point soon, this might be a good place to start. It’s quite an inspiring story too – a real triumph of the human spirit over adversity.
Incidentally, did you know that there is a film about Hawking? He’s played by Benedict Cumberbatch no less, so the acting’s bound to be good and, though I haven’t seen it to comment on it myself, the reviewers on Amazon absolutely love it:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hawking-DVD-Benedict-Cumberbatch/dp/B00EKFI1FC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1389268139&sr=8-1&keywords=hawking
Hi Leander,
Yes, I knew about the film when I was writing my review, actually, and I’m sure I’ll watch it at some point. He is really a character to get to know, and the book is direct and easy to understand.
Thanks for commenting!!
This sounds fantastic. I love reading autobiographies and memoirs, and I love science, so this seems like a natural fit. Hawking is endlessly fascinating to me. And I’m gawking at Benedict Cumberbatch in that Hawking image above. Yay!
So I suppose that you are another girl who is going to watch the film 🙂
I haven’t read many autobiographies, but I would like to read more, so well, that’s a start. I think you would like the book too.
Now I’m super interested in Brief history of time, as you can imagine!
I understand not rating nonfiction. I’ve read some where it’s like this is someone’s life…how can I put a rating on this. It’s usually the more serious or sad ones that do that to me.
Exactly, Jennine; I haven’t found a way to rate it, so for the moment there won’t be rating for these non-fiction books but that doesn’t mean I didn’t like them 😉
Isi:
i would love to read this book, and it may come in handy to gain books towards finishing your reading challenge 😉
I think you would like this one, Ale, since you read a lot of biographies and memoirs of differente popular people. And yes, my challenge goes first! 😉
As someone who does science, I love books that accurately portray what doing science is like. Thanks for the great review! 🙂
Thankd you! Yes, people have a wrong idea abou science, God knows why, and these kinds of books help scientists to show everybody what they really do 🙂
I’m not a science girl, but this sounds great!
Reading about interesting people, in every area, is always interesting. I’m so glad I was approved! Now I have to read some of his books about science!