Dickinson has designed a superb introduction to astronomy that is clear, concise, beautifully illustrated and very user friendly no matter what the child's age.The book is divided into three sections. The first is a 10-step voyage from the Earth's vicinity to the distant reaches of the universe. Organized by increasing distance from the Earth, it touches on the Moon, Mars, Pluto, comets, the three stars of Alpha Centauri, the center of the Milky Way, the Large Magellanic Cloud, the Andromeda Galaxy, and vantage points at 10,000,000 light-years from Earth and 300,000,000 light-years from Earth.The second section, Alien Vistas, is a sequence of 10 close-up looks at some of the most interesting objects mentioned in the first section, including all the planets of the solar system, stars, black holes and quasars, and makes speculations about extraterrestrial life.The final section is a guide to viewing the night sky, which enables readers to go outside on any clear night of the year and identify celestial objects. There is a glossary with explanations of unfamiliar terms and for pronunciations.Exploring the Night Sky is a clearly written, well-illustrated introduction to astronomy for anyone interested in the universe around us.

    With 50 detailed illustrations by NASA artist Rawlings, the guidebook covers Moonbase history, architecture, ecology, transportation, science projects, jobs, training, industries, tourism, sports ("lunar jai alai"), entertainment, day-to-day life, duties, rights and laws: "No one is allowed to walk on the surface alone, except in the specially marked 'Moonwalk Lanes.' " Combining fact and fiction in this "future history," Bova presents a compelling and persuasive argument for mankind's continual exploration of the moon and the establishment of a base on the lunar surface.

    

    

    In this book, we gather together the scientists, the intellectuals, and the artists, to learn about and speculate upon the cosmos. The world right now desperately needs both the physicist and the dreamer. G-d has blessed us with the most magnificent world imaginable. We have barely made the first steps in seeing all the light in the darkness. Perhaps it is the dreamer who will find out the nature of dark matter; perhaps it is the scientist who will find solutions to needless hunger and mindless war. For them both, the bounty of the Earth and the cosmos is the currency of hope. Humanity must use what it has been blessed with to survive. Then, as in Paul Simon s phrase, we all might be dancing together with diamonds on the soles of our shoes. They will be the diamonds of the stars and it will be a dance of peace.

    The mission has begun a year earlier; however, with the select of its crew. Before Lift-off is the extraordinary day-to-day story of these astronauts' training and flight-and is as close as most of us will ever come to flying on the space shuttle.New Yorker writer Henry Cooper obtained unprecedented permission from NASA to follow the 41-G crew from its formation through the completion of its mission. He was even given access to the heart of the training program: the crew's sessions in the shuttle mision simulators.More than a chronical of different phases in the astronauts' learning process, Before Lift-off tells the story of the bonding of these men and women. It would be Captain Robert Crippen's fourth space flight, his second command in six months, and Sally Ride's second shuttle voyage. For rookies Davida Leestra, Jon McBride, and Kathy Sullivan, and for two payload specialists, the experience would mark an initiation into the most elite groups-those people who have ventured into space.

    Moreover, he presents a warehouse of documentation--much of it anecdotal--to support his case. As a frontline buttress to Good's claims, England's former Chief of Defense Staff, Lord Hill-Norton, offers a spirited foreword crying "cover-up" on the part of world governments. Good's dossier persuasively backs up this charge with a rundown--beefed up by info obtained via the Freedom of Information Act--on a horde of UFO encounters, government responses, & both open & clandestine state investigations into UFOs. First England, then assorted lands including China & the USSR, then the US come under his scrutiny; altho many of the encounters--e.g., the alleged recovery of alien bodies from crashed craft in Socorro, NM, in 1947 and in Aztec, NM, in 1948--are familiar, the sheer quantity of UFO sightings recounted here astounds. Particularly intriguing is Good's discussion of astronauts' reports--ranging from Mercury astronaut Donald Slayton's statement of spotting something that "looked like a saucer, a disk" while testing a P-51 jet fighter to a credulity-stretching report that has ham-radio buffs picking up Apollo 11 calling Mission Control during the 1969 lunar landing & saying, "I'm telling you there are other spacecraft out there...they're on the moon watching us." More weighty, however, is Good's dogged tracking of the CIA & NSA's monitoring & suppression of UFO research--suppression mirrored in other countries (e.g., in Brazil via a Sao Paulo State directive forbidding media "to divulge UFO reports without the prior censorship of the Brazilian Air Force"). There's no smoking gun here, but enough circumstantial evidence to convince that governments have, & are, withholding important data about UFOs. Good's encyclopedic approach blurs the eyes even as it overwhelms skepticism; not a grand read, then, but certainly a noteworthy contribution to the field.--Kirkus