"A Brief History of Black Holes and why Nearly Everything You Know About Them is Wrong" by Becky Smethurst

 

Publisher: McMillan

Copyright: 2022

ISBN: 9781529086706

This book is an excellent overview of the history and current state of knowledge of Astronomy, Astrophysics, and black holes in particular. It is well written, very informative, and should appeal to many readers.

Dr. Smethurst takes the reader on a historical as well as contemporary look at how black holes were discovered, and the people who did the discovering. She also takes the reader on an astrophysical journey that explains numerous other concepts that are barely touched on in a lot of other books.

Her first book "Space at the Speed of Light: The History of 14 Billion Years for People Short on Time" I reviewed back in November 2021, and this book is a great companion that will hopefully lead numerous students towards careers in astronomy and astrophysics.

Highly recommended, a great addition to any library.

"Dinosaurs: A Field Guide" by Gregory S. Paul

 

Publisher: A. & C. Black

Copyright: 2010

ISBN: 9781408130742

This was a very well written book that gives a lot of valuable information to the reader, unfortunately it is also extremely difficult to find and I had to obtain it through interlibrary loan.

Mr. Paul takes you on a very informative journey through pretty much all aspects of the science of palaeontology, and provides the reader with lots of information. This area of science however is constantly changing, so I sincerely hope that he will consider doing an update to this book as many of the books on palaeontology are either too technical for the layperson, or are primarily geared towards younger enthusiasts. These younger enthusiasts are our future palaeontologists  and this book spans the gap in material.

Highly recommended, but be prepared to have to hunt for it.

"Welcome to the Universe: An Astrophysical Tour" by Neil deGrasse Tyson, Michael A. Strauss, and J. Richard Gott

 

Publisher:  Princeton University Press

Copyright:  2016

ISBN: 9780691157245

This was an amazing book that gives the reader an in depth look into the science of astrophysics. The three authors have written their sections in a clear and concise way that explain the concepts very well, and easily gets the message across.

In the first part  Dr. Tyson takes the reader on a study of the stars, planets and life in ten chapters that deal with a number of important concepts including explanations of the size and scale of the universe, Newton's Laws,  The lives and deaths of star, the classification of solar objects (e.g., Pluto) and the search for life.  Dr. Strauss then takes over and takes about galaxies in six chapters which include the Milky Way itself, our place in the universe, quasars, black holes, etc. Then Dr. Gott adds eight chapters in the third section that talk about both the general and special theories of relativity, black holes, string theory, the big bang, etc.

This was an extremely interesting  book to read, and even though it is a few years old at this time the information is still very relevant and should be of great value to anybody interested in astronomy or astrophysics. In addition, it is easily readable, and I believe would be a great addition to all school libraries, and would also make an excellent introductory text for first year university students.

"The God Equation: The Quest for a Theory of Everything" by Michio Kaku

 

Publisher: double day, New York

Copyright: 2021

ISBN: 9780385542746

This is an extremely interesting book, that would make a fantastic introduction to high school or first year university students into the history of physics. In reading this book I have learned a lot that I probably should've learned many years ago when I took physics. Mind you that was a long time ago, and since then the strides that have been made in the field have been huge.

Dr. Kaku takes us on a journey through the history of physics by explaining the idea of unification, Einstein's search for unification, the rise of the quantum theory, a possible theory for almost everything, dark matter and dark energy, and finally string theory.

Throughout the book he explains the concepts extremely well and in plain language that virtually everybody will understand.

I haven't read any of his books previous to this but will definitely be on the lookout for the other nine he has written in the last few years.