We’ve thought long and hard in the past about how to review
books written by our editor, Brian Clegg. For this book we’ve
gone for a summary of what it’s about and a few quotes from an
independent review in Kirkus Reviews. This is the thesis of the
book: Since astrophysicist Fred Hoyle coined “Big Bang” as a
term of abuse for a theory that he despised, it has become
everyday usage. Although few of us really understand what the
Big Bang was, it is now accepted wisdom that this was how the
universe began. But the idea of Big Bang doesn’t so much answer
questions as raise new ones. If the universe as we know it
originated in the Big Bang, what came before? And the Big Bang
is not set in stone. It’s just the current favorite of a number
of theories that explain the origins of the universe. At one
time a taboo subject, science is now prepared to look back past
the beginning – to answer the ultimate question of life, the
universe and everything with something more satisfying than
Douglas Adams’ cryptic 42. Why ther