I know I’ve used the phrase “I couldn’t stop reading this book” before in my life. I’ve probably said the words “particle physics” at least once or twice (back in college, one of my roommates was a physics major and one of my co-officers in the GLB Student Union was sciencey). I’m certain that until this week I’ve never combined the two into “I couldn’t stop reading this book about particle physics.”

Nobel-prize winner Leon Lederman, along with Dick Teresi, managed to write a book in 1993 that has done more to interest me in science than the combined efforts of many teachers, friends and many other dumbed-down introductions.

Let me back up. Last week, while book shopping with Jennifer, we stopped in the Modern Times Bookstore. Not seeing anything on the political table that piqued my interest, nor in the new fiction, and bypassing the feminist section altogether, I eventually found myself staring at the science section of the store (way in the back) where a book with a horrid cover design caught my eye. I picked it up because a) the typography was so terrible, b) the colors were putrid, and c) the title The God Particle: If the Universe is the Answer, What is the Question? was… actually kind of clever.

Standing in the back of the bookstore, I glanced through the introduction. Prefacing this 2006 edition, Lederman cracked a few jokes and wrote in a straightforward way. I put the book back down. “No way could I stand reading 414 pages of theory about deep physics,” I thought. “I already know it’s all math once you get past a certain point.” My experiences trying to crack some of the ideas in sci-fi with wikipedia (i.e. Planck units) convinced me I’d never understand most of this stuff.

But then after walking away from the book, I wandered back over to it. Nothing else sounded interesting. I’m so glad I took a chance.

A quick internet search tells me that there are dozens (if not hundreds) of different theories of learning, each with their own learning styles. I won’t get into all that. Let’s just say that Lederman’s narrative tour of physics suits me just fine. Yes, at a certain point, it was a bit like listening to Italian opera–I can muddle out enough words in time to get the idea, but it’s easier to just appreciate the music. But like that Italian opera, I’m guessing that if I were to read it again, I’d “get” more of the theory because the names won’t seem as confusing (seriously… nucleus, neutron, neutrino… muon, pion, lepton, boson… would it be so bad to name these things “Charlie” “Jean-Claude” and “Gizmo”?).

Some of the charm of Lederman’s approach is his voice. Plenty of wit, the willingness to say “this is all math, so let’s skip it and just trust me, it works,” and a fierce pride in both his own contributions to the field and the role of experimentalists versus theorists.

So, I’ll never do anything more than embarrass myself in a conversation with someone who studies this stuff… someone who can be bothered with the math. Despite that, I feel like I now know more than most people in our massively science-illiterate country. At one point in the day, my computer at the office (which is slow and old) froze up for about 30 seconds. I blurted out, “Goddammit, computer, I’m asking you to attach a jpeg to an email, not discover the Higgs boson!” Yup, I now feel perfectly free to express new types of nerdiness.

Bottom line: I can’t speak to the accuracy of the book, it’s fairness to current theories in physics, or how up-to-date it is with the rapidly changing search for that smallest building block of the universe. But I enjoyed a book on a topic I’ve never cared to study in depth before. Take a chance on The God Particle.