A really excellent wide public book. Unlike many science books intended for general public, this one focusses with success on giving an *understanding* of key mathematical advances (not only their description). There are *proofs* in there, and they are perfectly clear. The author even gives deep insight on one of the most recent and difficult proofs ever written (the one of Fermat's last theorem). Morevoer the english is easy to understand.

I only have one concern, but it is an important one: there is a unjustified, unnecessary, and repeated claim that mathematics is *the* ultimate, perfect science. This is even more surprising when one notices that what is supposed to make mathematics superior is shown to be completely false all along the book. Mathematics are great; no need to say that they are better than other approaches to understand things...