Customer Reviews

Lyman Alpha Emitting Galaxies at High Redshift: Direct Detection of Young Galaxies in a Young Universe

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Breathtaking in its scope, dazzling in its depth, Lyman Alpha Emitting Galaxies at High Redshift is a nonfiction thriller that takes you on an emotional rollercoaster ride, leaving you gasping for air and begging for more. Whether you are a veteran spectroscopist or a newcomer to the field, Mr. Dawson's enthusiasm for the subject matter and charming writing style will pull you in and emerse you into a world rich in red-shifted photons and legible plot axes. Buy a copy of Lyman Alpha Emitting Galaxies at High Redshift, strap yourself in and enjoy the ride of a lifetime!

The field of Lyman-alpha emitting galaxies at high redshift is dying. Buy this book and give it to your children. Ask the author to come back from moneyworld and revive his old field. Do you see anyone stepping up to fill his shoes? Not likely.

Steven Arthur Dawson would like you to know something, but he's just a LITTLE bit shy about it. (tee hee!) His proclivities in private life are really none of our business, nor do we want them to be, and yet, like Yukio Mishima's "Confessions of a Mask", he just can't but HELP to make it so.

These two statements, on their bald, pink, and--dare I say it--quivering faces, would seem to be in direct contradiction. But really now, let's be honest: how many times can the words 'turgid', 'dark energy' and 'buttocks' appear in the same work of nonfiction? About 'cosmology', nonetheless?! (Don't know what sort of book lernin' yew gawt out there in California, yew fr'dum-hatin' San Diefranciscanitionites!)

At first, the bullhorn of luridity rang falsely in my ear, even played, as it were, six (perhaps eight) inches from it at THAT. Eventually, however, as the primordial 'Big' bang subsided, and the afterglow of Creation took hold, the elegant choice of metaphor--Multiverse-As-Onanism--reminded me of yet another work of curiously Japanese fiction, namely Junichiro Tanizaki's "The Makioka Sisters". In that work of fiction, the author managed to control his utter disgust for the depiction he chose to represent up until the ultimate sentence of the work, and there remarkably subtly at that: the bride-to-be's diarrhea.

In this piece, however, disgust is not the motivation. Instead, it is the joy and existential ecstasy of a gay man at peace with the multiverse, and his place within it.

I can't suggest this book as you can't possibly understand it. Face it, YOU didn't go to grad school for 7 years and you certainly did NOT earn a B.S. and B.A. like Dawson (how insecure is this dude?) And, just ask <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000BWQWUE/qid=1134030735/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_3/103-4515758-7367813?v=glance&s=books">Josh Bloom</A>, Dawson has no freakin clue what serendipitous even means. Nice job with the cover work, and that alone would have earned Dawson 4 stars, but face it, nobody's gonna get past the dedications and if you meet someone who claims otherwise (like the other reviewers) ask them about co-moving volumes at z=5.8 and walk away slowly as they wet themselves with fear... fear of being caught in their own lies. Finally, I don't think science can be used to support or refute the outlandish claim offered in Chapter VI that "going observing with your advisor is like going deer hunting with an accordion." Is this the last we've heard from Dawson on the subject? This detective says yes. Now, put your mother on the phone; I have a few questions I'd like to ask her.

Dr. Dawson is known for his other-worldly grasp of all things esoteric and his ability to explain them to obtuse minions like me. I'm looking forward to finally understanding lyman-alpha-emitting galaxies at high redshift, and I know that this book will not disappoint! I have been waiting for this book for 6-7 years.

I haven't actually read this book yet, but Steve Dawson usually has great things to say. I may purchase it for the cover art alone.