Description

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Visit one hundred extraordinary stars that unveil the mysteries of the universe

Our own Sun—a source of awe, myth, and mystery for untold generations of sky-gazers—is just one of roughly two hundred billion trillion stars. Together, they’re a window into the profoundest questions in physics—overturning, again and again, how we understand light, matter, time, and existence itself. Florian Freistetter explains all this and more, in brief, easy-to-read profiles of the hundred most history-making stars, inviting readers to gaze into the past and future of the universe alongside a stellar cast of scientists— from Annie Jump Cannon, who revolutionized how we classify the stars, to Dorrit Hoffleit, who first counted them. Enjoy your journey through the cosmos . . .

• GRB 080319B, the farthest we’ve seen into space with the naked eye


• V1364 CYGNI, pivotal in the discovery of dark matter


• 72 Tauri, definitive evidence for Einstein’s theory of relativity


• Algol, called the Demon Star for its mysterious blinking—and many more!

Publisher’s note: 100 Stars That Explain the Universe was previously published in hardcover as The Story of the Universe in 100 Stars.

About the Author

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Florian Freistetter, PhD, is a freelance science journalist and the author of several popular science books on astronomy, including Isaac Newton: The Asshole Who Reinvented the Universe. He has published more than five thousand articles on his blog, Astrodicticum Simplex, which is one of the most-read German-language science blogs. He writes a weekly column about mathematics for spektrum.de, as well as many other articles for a variety of publications. He lives in Germany.

Praise For…

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2021 Foreword Indies Finalist



"A good introductory read for those who are interested in the stars and looking for something that is not technical.

— Seattle Book Review

Useful for public libraries and amateur stargazers who want to learn more about some key stars and their contribution to knowledge of the universe. . . . Recommended.
— Choice Reviews

An ingenious basic course in astronomy.
— Die Welt

Delightful . . . an excellent diversion for people of all levels of astronomical knowledge.
— BBC Sky at Night Magazine

Our cosmic narrative is told in a very different, inventive manner by the Austrian writer and astronomer Florian Freistetter, who examines it through the device of providing short portraits of his hundred favourite stars. It’s the classic trick of focusing on the particular to tell a wider story, and here it is done beautifully.
— Times Literary Supplement