*A New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice Selection*
The first major biography of Peter Higgs, revealing how a short burst of
work changed modern physics
On July 4, 2012, the announcement came that one of the longest-running
mysteries in physics had been solved: the Higgs boson, the missing piece
in understanding why particles have mass, had finally been discovered.
On the rostrum, surrounded by jostling physicists and media, was the
particle's retiring namesake--the only person in history to have an
existing single particle named for them. Why Peter Higgs? Drawing on
years of conversations with Higgs and others, Close illuminates how an
unprolific man became one of the world's most famous scientists. Close
finds that scientific competition between people, institutions, and
states played as much of a role in making Higgs famous as Higgs's work
did.
A revelatory study of both a scientist and his era, Elusive will
remake our understanding of modern physics.