Customer Reviews

Abell's Exploration of the Universe (Abell's Exploration of the Universe, 7th ed)

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2 star:		(2)
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I used this book to complete my Space Science degree. The first half of the book is dedicated to the explanation of the physics invloved in space. The author explains complicated concepts in a way that is easy to understand. The second half focuses on planets of the solar system and astronomy. There are really nice pictures and drawings. I used it a lot.

This is an update of the classic introductory text for scientists by the late George Abell. It is demanding for a general reader, but perfect for a science major. In general, there is a big gap between the general astronomy text for the nonscientist (these tend to have color pictures on every page, and to either leave out quantitative reasoning all together or to stick all the equations together in a little isolated box), and the more advanced astrophysics books by Zeilik and Gregory and Carroll and Ostlie. This text clearly identifies the more quantitative secions by placing them in slight smaller typeface, but they are still there for the interested reader or instructor.

There are plenty of books out there for those who, like some reviewers here, found this text too difficult. There is definitely a market for this book.

This book is a major disappointment. All though fairly detailed, the book covers next to nothing. Do yourself a favour - spend your money on 3 or 4 books. Not only will you be getting more for your money, but your library will have been expanded even greater...

I used this book for my Survey of Astronomy class. The thought exercises will have you thinking for days. The problem exercises are so hard to figure out you will need an advanced algebra class to comprehend. I had to read and re-read the thought exercises over to get a better understanding of the questions. I thought that this book was very difficult in nature. It should have been made more simple. The pictures in the book were very beautiful.