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John Archibald Wheeler has been driven by his curiosity about the “laws on
which all else is built—deep happy mysteries, I like to call them”.
Inspired by the idea that “Everything Is Particles”, in 1952 he fell in love
with general relativity and gravitation (Everything Is Fields). Now he is “in
the grip of a new vision, that Everything Is Information” (see Editorial, p 3,
and “I is the law”, p 24). In Geons, Black Holes & Quantum Foam, written
with Kenneth Ford, he remembers his extraordinary life. He coined the terms
“black hole” and “quantum foam”, worked on fission, geons and gravity. His
collaborators are 20th-century physics: share a train ride with Fermi, a gossip
with Einstein, work with Bohr, Gödel and Penrose. An elegantly written,
enthralling account of the gravity man. Published by W. W. Norton,
$27.95, ISBN 0393046427.