so, this book. a couple of weeks ago i saw "the theory of everything" and became intrigued by the true story behind the movie. this memoir gave me good insight on what it is like to be married to and parenting three children with a genius facing a terrible disease, who refuses to talk about the disease, get help for the disease, or do anything except sulk around being a genius. it's a pretty unfortunate situation all around, but i'm always interested in the lives of the women who support famous men.

this book is pretty long and goes into excruciating detail about some of the strangest things, while skimming over others. for example, hawking hardly talks about the feelings or experience of first falling in love with stephen, but spends something like 3 pages talking about repainting the walls of the first home they lived in. sometimes a chapter will spin off into detailed research concerning her thesis, which she should definitely be proud of, but breaks up the narrative a bit. so kind of a cumbersome read, but still worth a skim if you're curious about the hawking family.

I have a love/hate relationship with this book. I hate the tiny size of the type. I would have preferred a 1000 page book with larger text, but I managed to suck it up and get through this. I also hate that I hate how dry some parts were. I wanted to love the entire book, but it wasn't until the second half that I fell in love with it. I love that Jane stepped up and made her side of things known. I imagine that it took insane courage for her to be able to talk about all the hardships she faced while married to Stephen. I admire her strength, and the tremendous amount of selflessness she must have, to have endured all of that and never doubted her love for her family. I was humbled to learn that she did everything she possibly could to make sure that everyone she loved had everything they needed, even if she had to bend over backwards for it. It's unfortunate that things eventually unraveled, however, I feel that she's even stronger now that she can be the center of her own life.
It takes immense courage to stand in the background while the one you love achieves everything they want in life, and everything you do to help them achieve it is nothing more than something you're obligated to do as their spouse. I admire Jane for standing beside him for so long, and caring for him to the extent that she did, when it would have been easier to leave him in the care of someone else. I admire her courage for enduring as much as she did, while somehow maintaining her sanity, and a sense of order in her household, as well as her own life.

I quit at 50% after weeks of plodding through it. The book is so boring. The writing is awful. It's like Jane Hawking is narrating each little detail of her life. Most of them irrelevant. So, you know her daughter likes ballet and son sleeps in a certain manner but you know nothing about her feelings. There is very little about Stephen and who he is as a person.
I am glad I put down the book. It's something I rarely do but this has been an absolute waste of time

I saw the biographical movie about Stephen Hawking. I was curious about his wife. Jane Hawking chose to date and marry a man with a serious disease who was expected to live only 2 years. As a long time caregiver of a handicapped person, I was interested in reading about someone who chose this lifestyle.

I don't really know what to think of Jane. She's clearly intelligent, capable and kind. She obviously came from a privileged background. Jane has a great deal of resilience as she ended up taking on tasks that she clearly did not expect.

Jane bravely admits that she was not given the resources she needed to take care of Stephen's overwhelming needs. She is fortunate that she had a supportive family to help. She has resentment of Stephen's family but honestly they seemed quite loving to me. She is fair enough in this book to allow that side of them to come through, albeit begrudgingly.

After Stephen's reputation grew, she was afforded great wealth and opportunities. Her long term relationship with her now husband Jonathan is strange, but perhaps understandable. She was jealous of Stephen's success and acclaim when she herself is an educated person. Well Jane, welcome to the real world. You are a generic linguist, your husband is one of the greatest geniuses alive. Why would you expect anything different? I do believe Jane when she makes the case that Stephen would not have achieved his fame without her. He was much too frail to do his work without a dedicated helpmate.

Still, her resentment of Stephen Hawking seems unreasonable. Tenzing Norgay, college interns, wives, mothers and ghostwriters worldwide might agree. Jane should know better than most that life is not fair.

I really enjoyed some aspects of this book, but parts of it were really hard to get through because of the science jargon and historical info. about astrophysicists. I enjoyed reading about Stephen and Jane's relationship and their struggles with society and disability. Their story was interesting and complicated. This is a very one sided look at their situation and Jane's biased viewpoint left me wondering what the other half of the story might be.

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This was intense and long but I warmed to the author very quickly. I have no idea how she managed to cope with all she did and unlike other readers I do not detect complaint or self pity, just a longing to be heard and to tell her own story. She does not seek to destroy her husband's reputation in any way. Extremely intelligent, she can write about science, literature or languages with equal clarity and her character is reflected in her children who have all made good lives for themselves and who remain close. I admire her tenacity and am pleased she has found some happiness and fulfilment.

I'd say 3.5 stars, but I'll round it up to 4. Overall, very nicely written and engaging, but sometimes the writing was arduous to get through with all the effort she put into describing every single detail.

So let’s talk about this book –and yet I don’t even know what to say. Look I always have what to say but ‘mam not this time I guess – feels like my mind is laughing at me –sorry missy this is the book that leaves you in “OK THAT IS WHOLE POINT?” kind of moment. So in general I bought this book to inspire myself and sure Stephen Hawking is inspiring persona –he is but this biography is just one book at track I could but didn’t have to read –it didn’t make any change in my life. I highly recommend movie that is based on this book “The Theory of Everything” (Eddie Redmayne’s Academy Award winning performance) because many things from the book is cut and you rely just get point of all. This…well this was kind of boring. I’m sorry.
Biggest pros: Stephen as man who didn’t come to success over the night; Jane working on her education against all odds.
Biggest cons: May details you wouldn’t care like –what they children did during play how children adapted to they younger sibling; Lost focus of main thing -Stephen
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Srb:
Ne znam šta da vam kažem. A ja uvek imam šta da kažem. Osećam se kao da mi se sopstvena glava smeje na ovu rečenicu kao –sorry draga ovaj put nemaš šta da kažeš. Knjiga te ostavlja u u “to je cela poenta?” osećaju. U general kupila sam knjigu da bih inspirisala sebe, i istina je da je Stiven Hoking inspirativna persona zaista jedte alio ova biografija je samo još jedna u nizu knjiga koje sam pročitala a nisam morala jer nije napravila nikakvu razliku u mom životu. Preporučujem film koji je adaptacija ove knjige –“Teorija Svega” (Film za koji je Edi Redmejn dobio Oskara za najboljeg glumca), jer je film prava mera nema nepotrbnih stvari, veći je focus na Stivena i lakše se dolazi do poente. Ova knjiga je bila…pa prilično dosadna da budem iskrena.
Najveće prednosti knjige: Sam Stiven kao čovek koji je morao debelo da se izbori za svoj uspeh; Džejn koja je uprkos svemu uspela da završi svoje obrazovanje i nije odustala od istog.
Najveće mane knjige: Previše nepotrebnih detalja poput toga –kako su se igrala njihova deca i kako su starija deca prihvatila novog člana porodice; Foksu koji prelazi na njen život kada zapravo treba da bude na njegovom.