The story of Galileo's daughter, Sister Maria Celeste, as told through her letters to her father. A companion to the bestselling Galileo's Daughter, the letters are edited and introduced by Dava Sobel. Galileo Galilei was at the heart of the most dramatic collision in history between science and religion. But the great Italian scientist was also a loving father who treasured his illegitimate daughter, Virginia. She was perhaps her father's equal in brilliance, industry and sensibility, and became his greatest source of strength during his most difficult years. Now readers can follow their story, as she told it, in this beautiful volume of her surviving 124 letters to Galileo. Both in their original Italian and translated into English by the author of Galileo's Daughter, these entrancing letters still speak in the present tense, suspended in the urgency of their once current affairs.

The tenth anniversary edition of the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest: the search for the solution of how to calculate longitude and the unlikely triumph of an English genius. With a new Foreword by the celebrated astronaut Neil Armstrong. 'Sobel has done the impossible and made horology sexy - no mean feat' New Scientist Anyone alive in the 18th century would have known that 'the longitude problem' was the thorniest scientific dilemma of the day - and had been for centuries. Lacking the ability to measure their longitude, sailors throughout the great ages of exploration had been literally lost at sea as soon as they lost sight of land. Thousands of lives, and the increasing fortunes of nations, hung on a resolution. The quest for a solution had occupied scientists and their patrons for the better part of two centuries when, in 1714, Parliament upped the ante by offering a king's ransom (GBP20,000) to anyone whose method or device proved successful. Countless quacks weighed in with preposterous suggestions. The scientific establishment throughout Europe - from Galileo to Sir Isaac Newton - had mapped the heavens in both hemispheres in its certain pursuit of a celestial answer. In stark contrast, one man, John Harrison, dared to imagine a mechanical solution. Full of heroism and chicanery, brilliance and the absurd, LONGITUDE is also a fascinating brief history of astronomy, navigation and clockmaking.

Anyone alive in the eighteenth century would have known that "the longitude problem" was the thorniest scientific dilemma of the day--and had been for centuries. Lacking the ability to measure their longitude, sailors throughout the great ages of exploration had been literally lost at sea as soon as they lost sight of land. Thousands of lives and the increasing fortunes of nations hung on a resolution. One man, John Harrison, in complete opposition to the scientific community, dared to imagine a mechanical solution--a clock that would keep precise time at sea, something no clock had ever been able to do on land. "Longitude" is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest and of Harrison's forty-year obsession with building his perfect timekeeper, known today as the chronometer. Full of heroism and chicanery, it is also a fascinating brief history of astronomy, navigation, and clockmaking, and opens a new window on our world.

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Dava Sobel, the "inspiring" (People), little-known true story of women's landmark contributions to astronomy A New York Times Book Review Notable Book Named one of the best books of the year by NPR, The Economist, Smithsonian, Nature, and NPR's Science Friday Nominated for the PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award "A joy to read." -The Wall Street Journal In the mid-nineteenth century, the Harvard College Observatory began employing women as calculators, or "human computers," to interpret the observations their male counterparts made via telescope each night. At the outset this group included the wives, sisters, and daughters of the resident astronomers, but soon the female corps included graduates of the new women's colleges-Vassar, Wellesley, and Smith. As photography transformed the practice of astronomy, the ladies turned from computation to studying the stars captured nightly on glass photographic plates. The "glass universe" of half a million plates that Harvard amassed over the ensuing decades-through the generous support of Mrs. Anna Palmer Draper, the widow of a pioneer in stellar photography-enabled the women to make extraordinary discoveries that attracted worldwide acclaim. They helped discern what stars were made of, divided the stars into meaningful categories for further research, and found a way to measure distances across space by starlight. Their ranks included Williamina Fleming, a Scottish woman originally hired as a maid who went on to identify ten novae and more than three hundred variable stars; Annie Jump Cannon, who designed a stellar classification system that was adopted by astronomers the world over and is still in use; and Dr. Cecilia Helena Payne, who in 1956 became the first ever woman professor of astronomy at Harvard-and Harvard's first female department chair. Elegantly written and enriched by excerpts from letters, diaries, and memoirs, The Glass Universe is the hidden history of the women whose contributions to the burgeoning field of astronomy forever changed our understanding of the stars and our place in the universe.

After the huge national and international success of 'Longitude' and 'Gallileo's Daughter', Dava Sobel tells the human story of the nine planets of our solar system. This groundbreaking new work traces the 'lives' of each member of our solar family, from myth and history, astrology and science fiction, to the latest data from the modern era's robotic space probes. Whether revealing what hides behind Venus's cocoon of acid clouds, describing Neptune's complex beauty, or capturing first-hand the excitement at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory when the first pictures from Cassini at Saturn were recently beamed to earth, Dava Sobel's unique tour of the solar system is filled with fascination and beauty. In lyrical prose interspersed with poems by Tennyson, Blake and others, 'The Planets' gives a breathtaking, intimate view of those heavenly bodies that have captured the imagination since humanity's first glimpse of the glittering night skies. Timely and timeless, 'The Planets' will engage and delight as it unravels the mysteries of the cosmos. It is of infinite relevance to this age in which new planets are being discovered elsewhere in our galaxy.

AN OBSERVER BOOK OF THE YEAR 'A peerless intellectual biography. The Glass Universe shines and twinkles as brightly as the stars themselves' The Economist #1 New York Times bestselling author Dava Sobel returns with a captivating, little-known true story of women in science In the mid-nineteenth century, the Harvard College Observatory began employing women as calculators, or "human computers," to interpret the observations their male counterparts made via telescope each night. As photography transformed the practice of astronomy, the women turned to studying images of the stars captured on glass photographic plates, making extraordinary discoveries that attracted worldwide acclaim. They helped discern what the stars were made of, divided them into meaningful categories for further research, and even found a way to measure distances across space by starlight . Elegantly written and enriched by excerpts from letters, diaries, and memoirs, The Glass Universe is the hidden history of a group of remarkable women whose vital contributions to the burgeoning field of astronomy forever changed our understanding of the stars and our place in the universe.

The bestselling author of Longitude and Galileo's Daughter tells the story of Nicolaus Copernicus and the revolution in astronomy that changed the world. 'Lively, inventive ... a masterly specimen of close-range cultural history' Wall Street Journal 'Fantastic ... A masterly telling of how Copernicus revolutionised science' The Times In the 1520s a Polish cleric named Nicolaus Copernicus developed a revolutionary theory which placed the Sun, not the Earth, at the centre of our universe. The secret existence of this manuscript tantalised scientists everywhere in Europe. Then in 1539 a young German mathematician, Rheticus, travelled to meet Copernicus in the hope of setting eyes on it. Dava Sobel tells the story of a new concept of the heavens, and how Rheticus persuaded the cautious Copernicus to allow him to take the precious but dangerous manuscript out into a world that it would change for ever. In her compelling style, Dava Sobel chronicles the history of the Copernican Revolution, relating the story of astronomy from Aristotle to the Middle Ages. And as she achieved with her international bestsellers Longitude and Galileo's Daughter, in A More Perfect Heaven, Sobel expands the bounds of popular science writing, giving us an unforgettable portrait of a major step forward in the human knowledge of our universe.

The story of Galileo's daughter, Sister Maria Celeste, as told through her letters to her father. A companion to the bestselling Galileo's Daughter, the letters are edited and introduced by Dava Sobel.