Lonely Hearts of the Cosmos: The Story of the Scientific Quest for the Secret of the Universe by Dennis Overbye
	(Illus.) HarperCollins Publishers 1991 viii+438pp. 0-06-015964-2 Index C, T, GA **

With this book, Overbye has scored a tour de force in the history of 20th-century cosmological theory. Using the lives of the contemporary theoreticians involved, he has woven a delightful tale of changes in perceptions of the birth of the universe, starting with the year 1948--when the 200-inch telescope on Mt. Palomar was dedicated--to the present. Through an approach that is almost completely anecdotal, the book covers the war between the Big Bangers and the Steady Staters, the impact of the discovery of quasars, the relevance of subatomic particle theory, symmetry, the Higgs field, and the Grand Unified Theory (GUT) without missing a beat. All this is accomplished in a form that is easy to read and comprehend and that makes it impossible to put the book down once you have begun to read it. Who can resist chapter headings like "God's Turnstile," "The Reluctant Cosmologist," "Zwicky' s Revenge," or "The Astrologer's Curse?" A terse epilogue brings the readers up to date as of 1990.

--Reviewed by Sidney Rosen in Science Books and Films, 27/4 (May 1991), p. 103.