The title is a little deceiving ... the theories aren't all by Stephen Hawking. But this book takes some very complicated ideas and makes them almost understandable.

For all science nerds out there - here is something I could understand and it has lots of pictures. Hawking can explain something so complex and make it meaningful. I kept thinking, "Oh - so that's why."

Very little in this book about Stephen Hawking or his work. Most of the book is about the history of cosmology. I was surprised by how little about Stephen Hawking and his work was in this book

This is a fabulous bok. It explains the most complex theories and ideas presented by modern physics using language that the average reader can comprehend. If you thought you could never understand Relativity and Qauntum Mehchanics, Think again!

Really liked the basic explanations but felt the author fabricated too much religious/political connection to science.

lioke

Gut

A companion book for the BBC series. I read this book to accompany/to inform my reading of A Brief History of Time. I had tried to read A Brief history before and got stuck on the black hole chapters. I found this book at a a re-sale shop and bought it with the hope that it would make my reading of the other easier. It has.
Although Hawkings writes simply in his book, his style is still academic and dry. Stephen Hawking's Universe is written in the language like the language used on the television show, more relaxed. The relaxed writing made the difference for me.
I am reading A Brief History of Time for a reading club I have joined: Reading for Pleasure.

3.5/5

A basic look into the historical development of how we understand the universe and cosmology. Grateful that it is written in simple English as I would have been extremely lost with added physics and mathematics jargon.

Rescued from the local dump trailer. I've probably encountered most of what I've read so far(a lot of history) over the course of my now sort-of long life. I don't "get" all of it, but enough to keep me going. Back in high school(boarding school actually) I was a miserable science student. My first course was called AGM(Astronomy-Geology-Meteorology[?]) and I nearly flunked it. Then came Chemistry in my junior year, and I almost flunked THAT as well. When I went back to college in the 70's I took only one science class - Biology for Non-Majors. YAY! I got an "A"(I think) in that one.

Finished up last night and feeling like my understanding of life, the universe and everything is a BIT better than before. In some ways it still seems like a deep dark secret.

Meant for the general reader; it is a good overview of how we got from an earth, covered by a dome, with holes in it, revealing distant fires, believed by ancient peoples, to our current understanding, using instrumentation of our relatively, advanced, technologies.

A good book with lot of theories condensed together but with a great concluding philosophical question -' What is it all for? Science alone cannot answer this question.'