-
Your next favorite book
is waiting.
Although this book is literally somewhat 'briefer,' it actually expands on the great subjects of the original. Purely technical concepts, such as the mathematics of chaotic boundary conditions, are gone. Conversely, subjects of wide interest that were difficult to follow because they were interspersed throughout the book have now been given entire chapters of their own, including relativity, curved space, and quantum theory.
'Briefer History may be the clearest introduction to physics ever, and not just because it eschews equations, though that helps....Like the best biographies, it's an utterly engrossing read.' - Booklist.
Comment: According to Hawking, one copy of A Brief History of Time has been sold for every 750 people on earth (how many of them actually managed to read it from cover to cover is a different matter!) A Briefer History of Time is not only updated to include new material such as new developments in string theory, and new indications about a unified theory of physics, but it also attempts to simplify the concepts by shortening the length of the book and adding more illustrations.
This information about A Briefer History of Time was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Stephen Hawking is the former Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge and author of A Brief History of Time which was an international bestseller. Now the Dennis Stanton Avery and Sally Tsui Wong-Avery Director of Research at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics and Founder of the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology at Cambridge, his other books for the general reader include A Briefer History of Time, the essay collection Black Holes and Baby Universe and The Universe in a Nutshell.
In 1963, Hawking contracted motor neurone disease and was given two years to live. Yet he went on to Cambridge to become a brilliant researcher and Professorial Fellow at Gonville and Caius College. From 1979 to 2009 he held the post of Lucasian Professor at ...
If you liked A Briefer History of Time, try these:
by Ali Smith
Published 2026
From a literary master, a moving and genre-bending story about our era-spanning search for meaning and knowing.
Around the World in Eighty Games
by Marcus du Sautoy
Published 2024
An award-winning mathematician explores the math behind the games we love and why we love to play them.
by Frank Wilczek
Published 2022
One of our great contemporary scientists reveals the ten profound insights that illuminate what everyone should know about the physical world.
Theo of Golden by Allen Levi
One spring morning, a stranger arrives in the small southern city of Golden. No one knows where he has come from…or why…
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
