The Stars of Heaven

Do a little armchair space travel, rub elbows with alien life forms, and stretch your mind to the furthest corners of our uncharted universe. With this astonishing guide book, The Stars of Heaven, you need not be an astronomer to explore the mysteries of stars and their profound meaning for human existence.
Stars have fascinated humankind since the dawn of history and have allowed us to transcend ordinary lives in our literature, art, and religions. In fact, humans have always looked to the stars as a source of inspiration and transcendence that lifts us beyond the boundaries of ordinary intuition. In the tradition of One Two Three... Infinity, Pickover tackles a range of topics from stellar evolution to the fundamental and awe-inspiring reasons why the universe permits life to flourish. Where did we come from? What is the universe's ultimate fate? Pickover alternates sections that explaining the mysteries of the cosmos with sections that dramatize mind-expanding concepts through a fictional dialog between futuristic humans and their alien peers who embark on a journey beyond the reader's wildest imagination. This highly accessible and entertaining approach turns an intimidating subject into a scientific game open to all dreamers.
Told in Clifford Pickover's inimitable blend of fascinating state-of-the-art science and whimsical science fiction, and packed with numerous diagrams and illustrations, The Stars of Heaven unfolds a world of paradox and mystery, one that will intrigue anyone who has ever pondered the night sky with wonder.

• Introduction
• CHAPTER 1 : Stellar Parallax and the Quest for Transcendence
• CHAPTER 2 :The Joy and Paschen of Starlight
• CHAPTER 3 : Spectral Classes, Temperatures, and Doppler Shifts
• CHAPTER 4 : Luminosity and the Distance Modulus
• CHAPTER 5 : Hertzsprung-Russell, Mass-Luminosity Relations, and Binary Stars
• CHAPTER 6 : Last Tango on the Heliopause
• CHAPTER 7 : Stellar Evolution and the Helium Flash
• CHAPTER 8 : Stellar Graveyards, Nucleosynthesis, and Why We Exist
• CHAPTER 9 : Some Final Thoughts
• Notes
• Appendix 1. Stars in the Bible
• Appendix 2. Updates and Breakthroughs