ÌÇÐÄVlog

If physics aims to provide a theory of everything, then this book provides an explanation of everything. The author lays out his stall early on; the distinction between matter on the one hand, and forces on the other, lies in the corresponding distinction between fermions and bosons. It is a brave author who would dare to begin thus, but it works, and his success at explaining this distinction so early in the book is a pointer to his success later on. Indeed, when one realises that in this 300-odd page book, we meet Feynman diagrams on page 13, the way ahead begins to look arduous. But the style of explanation - tending to be a little too "gee-whiz" at times - is always relaxed and readable, and continues to reward the reader. Vincent Icke is clearly a master at providing convincing explanations of esoteric ideas.

Arguments based on symmetry are important in this book. This is not too surprising, perhaps, given that most, if not all fundamental arguments are in fact symmetry arguments ("Do unto others I"), and that the meat of this book is concerned with gauge symmetry, gauge twists and so on in a full-blown treatment of particle physics. All these ideas are pretty fundamental, and although the brilliance of the exposition makes for easy reading, the in-depth absorption of each successive idea requires slow reading .

Symmetry per se is perhaps a familiar concept, but in this book the more technical consequences of symmetry lead the reader into deeper waters. For example, the idea that the electron and the neutrino form a basis for the symmetry group SU(2), that there is an abstract kind of rotation that transforms the one into the other, needs to be grasped at some level to appreciate the consequences for pion and beta decay, and other matters too. Then comes the idea of symmetry breaking, and just the beginnings of a suspicion that particle physicists, from a theoretical standpoint, are a bit like the owner of a very old car. You get one part fixed, and something else goes wrong, so you get that fixed, and so on. But all this only adds to the excitement of the story. No dry as dust account, this: Icke takes the reader with him, through all the ups and downs of argument, on a quite exceptional merry-go-round of analogy and explanation. Grand unification and supersymmetry - with which the book ends - seem almost tame after the excitement of the electroweak force and the relation between the photon and the neutral vector boson.

So, who will read it? Students, certainly, but it will also be enjoyed by all scientists. In addition, however, it should be read by anyone interested in the history of ideas. If ever there were to be a book that persuades nonscientists that physics is understandable, even at its most esoteric outer limits, this is it.

Michael Leask is fellow in physics, St Catherine's College, Oxford.