Interstellar Tours: A Guide to the Universe from Your Starship Window

In this book Brian Clegg takes us on a trip into space on the board the starship Endurance. He starts off with giving us examples, most improbable, on how to reach our destination. An elevator to each orbit or getting beamed up into space being a few entertaining options.Once we’ve taken off the real adventure beings as we’re given a proper view into what we might see outside the windows of the Endurance with the help of QR codes included in the writing.(Accompanying Interstellar Tours is an online gallery with over fifty images and videos in full colour, each directly accessible from the page using QR codes.)I found the use of these QR codes to be ingenious as they really do give you a glimpse into space and the objects you might come across on a trip across the galaxy. It really gets the imagination going which is quite magical. At least it was for me.Broken down into 11 chapters Interstellar Tours does just that…takes you on a tour into discovery and exploration.My favourite chapter had to be on the Milky Way. It’s gorgeous and vast and mysterious. I learned what a MACHO and WIMP are and how they’re different. And, I have to admit dark matter creeps me out a bit.This was such a fantastic book as it really did test my imagination and it was extremely entertaining. Brian made science and math fun…if that’s truly possible.

Interstellar Tours is a virtual spaceship tour of the local universe, exploring places and phenomena of astronomical interest with plenty of photographs and easy-to-understand explanations. There's even some maths at the back for people who like equations with their astronomy.A recommended read for interested but intelligent non-experts.

I enjoyed the text. However, I feel a little cheated as the book contains no illustrations; you have to use the QR codes included within each section to view them online. Given how short-lived many Internet links and services are, this may be an issue in the future (i.e. download and save the pictures now for your own archival purposes). I understand why the author and publishers did this; it's a moneysaving feature, and fair enough I suppose, but it's not something I really welcome.

clegg is a populist and seemingly writes books to boost his ego. this book is the latest book to take a serious subject and make it read like a bad student essay. compared to Carlo Rovelli's take on the same subject clegg comes across as an armature. find Carlo Rovelli's book instead! (it's on amazon) science deserves serious, talented writes, unfortunately clegg is neither of these

In this fun and informative book, Brian Clegg welcomes you aboard his fictional starship Endurance for a tour among the stars, where he introduces the wonders on offer in our galaxy.The book takes the form of part-travelogue and part popular science text, covering an astonishing array of galactic phenomena for your space tourist delectation. From sinister black holes to a speculatively ballistic Betelgeuse, via all manner of planetary, starry, and satellite surprises, this trip allows you experience our corner of the cosmos in amazing detail. Clegg packs in facts about what we know about our galaxy; the work of the pioneers who have brought this knowledge to us; and the mechanics of space travel. He also conjectures about the things we may yet discover, and how to make this imaginary journey possible in the future.The physics Clegg covers is challenging at times, and even though he does his level best to explain it in easy terms, these are advanced concepts and theories. As a novice when it comes to the physics of space and time, despite being a fan of a grand space opera, I did struggle with parts of this book. However, if you love to revel in facts and theories and enjoy getting into the nitty gritty of the complex and conflicting notions of conventional and quantum physics, then you will find lots here to get your teeth into. I would recommend taking this book in small bites though, as there is a wealth of information to take on board in one go.My favourite thing about this book is the way Clegg uses the interstellar voyage concept as a theme, mixing in snippets of humour and references to some of the sci-fi shows we know and love, such as Star Trek. In a clever twist, rather than including illustrations, there are QR codes throughout to access photographs and videos to allow you to 'view' the wonders he is describing too, just as if you actually were sitting comfortably aboard an interstellar spaceship. This is very helpful in understanding the phenomena you are 'seeing through the starship windows'.This is not my usual kind of read, but it makes for an engaging mix of fact and fiction to dip in and out of. I learned many new things about the galaxy in which we live, and it made me ponder about what might really be possible in the future in terms of space travel. Highly recommended if you are a fan, or writer, of sci-fi space adventures too, as it is a useful resource about many of the weird and wonderful things that crop up in interstellar stories.