The Einstein name sells—witness Einstein Cafés, Einstein's Relativity Mints, Baby Einstein™ books and other baby paraphernalia, and an endless selection of Einstein T-shirts, puppets, mouse pads, dog tags, watches, coffee mugs, and other junk. I am glad that Cheng has thought to exploit this Einstein mania in a good cause, to entice students into a serious exploration of Einstein's work. All upper-level physics students will already have seen some of Einstein's contributions in their physics courses. Nevertheless, Cheng's book will prove valuable for them because it provides a comprehensive overview that places Einstein's work in the context of the post-Einstein developments, and it also includes some highly relevant topics from particle physics that have only a tenuous connection to anything Einstein ever did.
The book's topics are not arranged by chronology, but by taxonomy (atoms, quantum theory, special relativity, general relativity). Cheng begins with three of the five famous contributions...