Customer Reviews

Moon Observer's Guide

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The book covers a lot of good information, but it is poorly written and not laid out well. The first chapter rambles on for pages at a time about physical features on the moon and never shows a picture or map of where the feature is. For the current price (under $10) its not a total loss, but this is the second Firefly book I have read and they were both pretty bad.

Bottom Line: Bad book - Buy Exploring the Moon by Steve Massey instead.

This book has quite a bit of information on various lunar features. Unfortunately the included maps are very small and hard to read. Even worse, some features mentioned in the text are not even labeled in the maps. On the other hand, the labeling of the maps is overdone, and the format of showing slivers of the moon (centering around the terminator) makes it hard to get one's bearings even with an outline globe showing where the current map is featuring.

Given the shortcomings of the maps, the text could be just a tad more clear as to where one feature is in relation to another. Read the book slowly to get the maximum out of the descriptions. Other parts of the book regarding lunar geology and general observing are helpful. Get a good moon map or maybe a good magnifying glass to get the most from this book.

I do not disagree with the two previous reviews. So why am I giving it a 5 star review?
As Einstein would say, " it's all relative".

If one takes it as a beginners moon book, then you can learn alot really quickly. It presents basic concepts very efficiently; crater formation, age, magnitude,orbit, tide influence, moonlight, lunar data. All in the sweep of it's 1st forty pages. There's a nice section about eclipses, and investigation of the moon by manned spacecraft. But that's really short short. Then it goes on to describe moon watching equipment basics. And finally, about 90 pages devoted to nightly moon observing. It serves well if you buy yourself a good moon map. But then one could argue that maybe a bigger book would be in order. Some of them bigger books get too technical for the novice moonie. One thing is for sure, the current price of around $15 is too much. So what's it worth to me? Bout 6 bucks.