BIG BANGS AND BLACK HOLES

A lively look at some of the grand and mysterious phenomena that keep the observable universe ticking.

It’s Cosmology 101, as pale, red-haired fictive tour guide Dr. Celeste Aster puts it, and as she bounds off into a whirl of Herji’s text-heavy cosmic cartoon montages leading her blond, brown-skinned Gen-Z niece Gabrielle with guest lecturer (and real Nobel Prize Laureate) Michel Mayor panting along in tow, readers hoping to keep pace had better bring their scientific A games. After kicking off with a review of our changing conceptions of gravity, Einstein’s theory of general relativity, and the Standard Model of Cosmology, she explains the importance of core discoveries such as the cosmic microwave background and (with a nod to discoverer Henrietta Swan Leavitt) the value of Cepheid variables for measuring interstellar distances. Dr. Aster follows up by ushering “the biggest rock stars of the Universe…BLACK HOLES!” into view to explain what they are and how their collisions can produce gravitational waves, then closes by adding dark matter and dark energy to the Big Bang as mysteries still waiting to be understood. The full-color illustrations of human figures in animated poses, including glimpses of Einstein in skimpy bathing suit bottoms and cheery looking fundamental particles bonding or whizzing past each other, help lighten the substantial informational load.

A challenging overview conveyed with authority and contagious enthusiasm.