Rating: 
Summary: A horrible book written by an obvious novice.
Review: As a former professor of physics, I am greatly concerned that this book will be viewed by non-physicists as being on par with some of the excellent "pedestrian" books on advanced physics, such as "A Brief History of Time" or "The Elegant Universe".Mr. Magueijo's attempts to explain elementary electrodynamics and mechanics show that his mastery of physics would not even earn him a passing grade in one of my freshman-level courses. I would not be at all surprised if Cambridge contacted Mr. Magueijo and demanded that he return his diploma. As a trained and working mathematician and physicist, I would consider this book good to have around...for when I was in need of a laugh. The hardcover version, I am sure, is well suited for use as a paperweight. And most certainly, a person freezing to death would find warmth and light by setting the book afire. Beyond those uses, this book cannot be considered anything other than a waste of paper and ink.
Rating:
Summary: A horrible book written by an obvious novice.
Review: As a former professor of physics, I am greatly concerned that this book will be viewed by non-physicists as being on par with some of the excellent "pedestrian" books on advanced physics, such as "A Brief History of Time" or "The Elegant Universe". Mr. Magueijo's attempts to explain elementary electrodynamics and mechanics show that his mastery of physics would not even earn him a passing grade in one of my freshman-level courses. I would not be at all surprised if Cambridge contacted Mr. Magueijo and demanded that he return his diploma. As a trained and working mathematician and physicist, I would consider this book good to have around...for when I was in need of a laugh. The hardcover version, I am sure, is well suited for use as a paperweight. And most certainly, a person freezing to death would find warmth and light by setting the book afire. Beyond those uses, this book cannot be considered anything other than a waste of paper and ink.
Rating: 
Summary: Reads like two separate books
Review: I genuinely appreciate Joao Magueijo's attitude that its ok to challenge fixtures of conventional scientific wisdom. History shows that we stagnate scientifically when we get too comfortable with a sure thing. So although the fixed speed of light is thoroughly entrenched, its still fair game in my view, and I bought this book to hear about his theory. The first half of this book describes some basics of conventional cosmological thinking, including the special and general theories of relativity. This is appropriate and necessary for what is to come, and the examples presented are unique and interesting. But just when Mr. Magueijo seems prepared to delve into his own theories, he changes focus. Sure he pauses now and again to describe his work, but not with the same clarity and depth as before. Because what he really wants to convey in the second half of the book is how frustrating it is to deal with magazine editors and the bureaucracy of research institutions. And as much as we can all sympathize with these frustrations, he comes off at times as a young man simply railing against perceived injustices. It's a better book when he sticks to his enthusiasm for science. Yet I can still recommend it for open minded individuals with an interest in cosmology.
Rating: 
Summary: The Genius That Is Joao Magueijo
Review: I have just finished reading "Faster That The Speed Of Light" by João Magueijo. Anybody interested in the universe we live in or relativity must read this book. I have read many books on this subject including Stephen Hawking excellent books "A Brief History Of Time" & "The Universe In A Nutshell". This book manages to describe relatively (no pun indented) complex theories in a way even I can understand. He manages to break it down to grass roots level with his "cows in a field" analogy of Special Relativity. Not only does he achieve this, but also it introduces us to a concept that rocks the very foundations of physics, that the speed of light is not constant (or is it?). João manages to deliver all that while explaining the personal struggle he and his collaborators suffered within the scientific community while working on these theories, the highs and the lows and just how close they came to throwing it all in the trashcan. In summary this is the most interesting book I have had the pleasure of reading. The only drawback I can find, to the book, is that it's not finished yet, João were waiting for the sequel.
Rating:
Summary: Modern Science Novel
Review: I love to read about modern physics. Not that I'm some kind of expert, not for a long shot, but I enjoy trying to understand how all of this came to be. I already read books from Gamow, Hawking and even Einstein but this book was the one I enjoyed the most. The VSL theory is both refreshing and audacious, the kind you look at and wonder why nobody else had thought about it before. The way Magueijo wrote the book also helps a, potentially, boring subject to become more appealing. Be sure to get the uncensored version of the book to catch all the criticism to the American and European way of doing science in its raw form.
Rating:
Summary: the link is broken
Review: I only wish to let you know that in the Customer Reviews the link must be broken somewhere, since I cannot get all 54 reviews that are claim to exist. I can get only to about no.30
Rating: 
Summary: A VERY non-technical review of a VERY technical book!
Review: I picked up 'Faster Than the Speed of Light' at a local bookstore because a tag line on the bottom stated it was 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas meets A Brief History of Time'. As a huge fan of both Hawking and Thompson, I thought I couldn't go wrong. For the most part, I didn't and, make no mistake, that intro in probably the most salient review that can be given of this book! It truly does read less than a scientific white paper on the Varying Speed of Light (incorrectly reviewed here numerous times as 'Variable' Speed of Light)and more of a card-carrying theoretical physicist's daily notes on the grind of funding, symposiums and fellowships. It is a rarified world that Magueijo lives in and, personally, I find it refreshing to see the human side of these true 'rocket scientists', warts and all. Consider the implications of what the author had/has to deal with: changing the very nature of physics from the time of Einstein (and believe me, that is saying a LOT). Beside the obvious scientific suicide that that implies, Joao had to overcome monumental obstacles just to have fellow scientists even LISTEN to his viewpoint. To say that the old institutions are staid and unyielding is truly an understatement. I admire his guts for even trying. And never lose sight that he never once implies that his theory is anything more than that; he even closes with reinforcing that point and stating no one knows if Varying Speed of Light is right or not. It is beyond me how anyone can judge someone when they're that upfront with their idea. I will state humbly that it would take a PhD in Particle Phyics even to engage Mr. Magueijo in a review of his theory...it's compelling that like Mr. Hawking he does TRY to make his work known amongst the non-physicists of the world and for that, I'm thankful. Unlike Mr. Hawking, whos work can be understood by a layman, Mr. Magueijo's work (even without the math) is extraordinarily complex. I found myself backpeddling every single time I read the book in order to make the names, theorys and general circumstances make sense; it's not a book for the faint of heart, in any sense. Skip the need for an open mind; you'll need more than that just to keep up! But, and it's a big BUT, what if he's right? What if he's only partially right? What if only ONE SINGLE IDEA of his is close to right? That's not only my observation, but I'm willing to step out on a limb and state it's probably HIS observation as well. The point being, scientific discovery is made up of thinking 'outside-the-box'. If no one took the chance and tried, we would still be members of the 'Flat Earth' society. As I can tell I'm in the minority of the reviews here, I'll trust the reader to make their own informed decision on the fate of this book. Does it have squabbling and some petty jealousies involved? You bet it does! Does it break genuinely new ground? I'm unqualified to make that judgement, but I'd surmise just by the backlash the author received from some of the 'Old Guard' I'll bet it must. I'd give the book 4 or more stars if I thought everyone that picks it up could wade through it, but, if I'm any indication, some will find it frustrating; the subject is simply intense and extremely complex. But I did find it hard to put down simply because the author basically put his career out on a limb and TRIED. That's reason enough for me to enjoy the book and respect the man, even with the complexity and squabbling. Good book, fascinating subject, very readable, and very, very complex.
Rating: 
Summary: This Has Nothing To Do WIth FTL Travel
Review: I thought this might be another FTL travel speculation book when I picked it up. I was very dissapointed to learn the book has almost nothing to say about FTL travel at all. Instead this is an attempt to convey a theory other than inflation to explain how the universe got from the big bang to the state we see today. The first half of the book is a good recap of the theories os inflation and general and special relativity. This part of the book is well written, concrete, and easy to follow. The second half of the book is very dissapointing. It starts to get very squishy in a hurry. After reading it I had no idea what the theory was or what it stood for, other than being a direct frontal assault on Einstein's work. The second half of the book is filled with rants about other scientists, journal editors, and university administrators, but there is very little science. I think that without a catchy title, this book would never have been printed at all.
Rating:
Summary: Amateurish, at best.
Review: In what's becoming typical of the genre, this book is 90% self-indulgent drivel. It's filled with stories and backstories with very little actual science or math. "God" is mentioned about a thousand times as well. I prefer my science to be cult-free, thank you very much.
Rating:
Summary: A fast-paced text...
Review: Joao Magueijo's book `Faster than the Speed of Light' is an intriguing look into some of the `bleeding edge' theoretical realms of cosmology and theoretical physics, while also charting an all-too-familiar pattern of academic jealousy, intrigue, and the attempt by the established powers-that-be, the keepers of the dogmatic domain, to downplay those ideas (or persons) that might present significant challenge to their fields. In many ways, this is not unlike church structures of the past that saw it necessary to force thinkers such as Galileo to recant his scientific positions; alas, academic politics has always been among the more nasty of the forms of politics (Kissinger made this observation comparing the realms of academic politics with `realpolitik'); Mageuijo makes no secret about those he respects and those he does not in this text - one assumes he has a secure, tenure position somewhere, or a text like this could cost him such an opportunity. The science itself is intriguing - he traces in a somewhat disjointed way the pattern of physics discoveries that led up to the solidification of the `law of physics' that nothing travels faster than the speed of light, and that the speed of light (the term `c' in Einstein's famous equation E=mc-squared) is constant across all frames of observational reference. This constancy was not Einstein's idea - it was a discovery twenty years prior by Americans Michelson and Morley; Einstein incorporated it into this Special Theory of Relativity in 1905, and the game was afoot for the developments of twentieth-century physics and astronomy. Mageuijo discusses the development from these beginnings, as well as many of the problems and questions that were not solved from the beginning. The scientific exposition can become very complex - for example, Mageuijo's discussion of M-theory and Planck-sized strings (one-dimensional objects) and membranes (planar objects) `living in' eleven dimensions despite the four-dimensional space-time that we see becomes very difficult to follow. This book does not have much by way of equations (it is meant for a general audience rather than a scientifically elite audience), and mathematical structures do not always translate well into conversational English. Perhaps the primary item of note in this text is Mageuijo's idea of the Varying Speed of Light (VSL). Mageuijo mentions early in the text that even Einstein had a paper published (in 1911, after the Special Theory of Relativity but prior to the General Theory of Relativity) on the varying speed of light, but that this idea was jettisoned - rightly so, Mageuijo states, as that particular theory was wrong, but it nonetheless demonstrated that the sanctity of the constancy of the speed of light has never been complete. Mageuijo discusses his VSL theory in some detail (albeit without the mathematics to back it up, a decided drawback for this text; however, one assumes that mathematically-trained scholars will be able to find some such material for analysis), including some objections (scientific and mathematical as opposed to personal/professional) and the attempts to get around the problems raised. Overall, this is a fascinating book. It is rough around the edges (Mageuijo is a physicist, not a professor of English), but the ideas contained within are intriguing, and the story of the fight to get some recognition for a rogue idea (remember, please, that the idea that the earth and planets went around the Sun, rather than all the rest revolving around the earth, was once considered a rogue and radical idea, a threat to the stability not only of science but of society in general) meshed with the academic politics shows that no profession, however lofty and grand, is immune to the human foibles that beset us all.
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