plainpicture/Cultura/Joho
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Welcome to the Universe: An astrophysical tour
Neil deGrasse Tyson, Michael A. Strauss and J. Richard Gott
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Princeton University Press
How big is the universe? Is it full of intelligent life? And if so, will we find it? How do stars live and die? What happened to poor old Pluto? And what part did Neil deGrasse Tyson himself play in relegating it to the status of an ice ball in the outer solar system? These are just some of the riveting questions fielded by three top astrophysicists in engaging style, with great illustrations and just a handful of equations. They may just have produced the best book about the universe in the universe.
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The Indisputable Existence of Santa Claus: The mathematics of Christmas
Hannah Fry and Thomas Evans
Doubleday
Just in case the charm and beauty of mathematical thinking has passed by some of your friends and family, they will be grateful for this slim volume in their stocking. The puzzles and games of Hannah Fry and Thomas Evans involving present-wrapping and Queen’s Speech bingo are but an entry drug for heady passages about the nature of truth and game theory.
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What’s really happening to our planet? The facts simply explained
Tony Juniper, Foreword by HRH Prince Charles
DK
It’s not looking good, what with unsustainable population growth, degraded natural environments and climate change. We’ve made inroads on poverty, safer drinking water and literacy, but it’s not enough. Welcome, then, an infographics book on the state we’re in. As a long-time green campaigner, Tony Juniper was the obvious man to write it – and he has the wisdom to leave us with hope, as we contemplate the rise of small-scale hydropower and onshore wind energy, as well as sustainable, circular economies.
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Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs (second edition)
Gregory S. Paul
Princeton University Press
Gregory S. Paul is back with 100 new species and 200 new or updated illustrations to his vision of the Mesozoic era. Paul will always be the man who helped define the CGI on Jurassic Park, changing the look and feel of dinosaurs for a generation. This engaging volume is informed by the latest research, much of it from China. In a fully revised introduction, Paul explores his subject from head to tail, while the passage “If Dinosaurs Had Survived” is sure to leave readers misty-eyed.
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Big History: Our incredible journey, from big bang to now
David Christian
DK
In the teeth of the internet’s always-on, always-compelling son et lumière, publisher DK still produces illustrated books on… everything. This time, David Christian, co-founder of online teaching course the Big History Project, writes about all the observable universe and all observable time. Savvy readers will enjoy how the volume avoids the obvious pitfalls of collapsing astronomy, anthropology, physics and archaeology into one discipline. The rest of us will drop our jaws in wonder at the endeavour.
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Universal: A guide to the cosmos
Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw
Allen Lane
Some readers eat popular physics for breakfast. Others yearn for a single simple volume to bring them up to speed, thereby freeing them for the fun stuff (life sciences, tech stories, cat videos). Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw will satisfy both audiences with their broad-brush account of the physical world that still finds room for uncertainty, controversy — even a little light maths. Rarely has a difficult subject been rendered so accessible.
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Where the Animals Go: Tracking wildlife with technology in 50 maps and graphics
James Cheshire and Oliver Uberti
Particular Books
This is a special kind of detective story. After millennia of using footprints, faeces, feathers, broken foliage and nests to track animals, the process is now so teched up you need to read this book to find out the how, what and why. Geographer James Cheshire and designer Oliver Uberti worked with researchers and wildlife experts to collect billions of data points, taken from digital tags on humpback whales, magnetic fields tracking badgers, QR codes mapping an individual ant, and more. The last page shows genetic barcodes of the animals, and a human. How similar we look – at least on paper.
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US Spy Satellite Owners’ Workshop Manual
David Baker
Haynes Publishing
Ever wondered how the US learned to spy on the world from space? Here’s the story of the secret tech revolution spawned by the cold war. Developing reconnaissance and surveillance-camera technology to track Russia’s military strength was a deeply covert mission in itself. Mull in secret.
This article appeared in print under the headline “Gifts that keep on giving”
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