An Earthling's Guide to Outer Space: Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Black Holes, Dwarf Planets, Aliens, and More

by Bob McDonald

Beloved science commentator Bob McDonald takes us on a tour of our galaxy, unraveling the mysteries of the universe and helping us navigate our place among the stars. How big is our galaxy? Is there life on those distant planets? Are we really made of star dust? And where do stars even come from? In An Earthling's Guide to Outer Space, we finally have the answers to all those questions and more. With clarity, wisdom, and a great deal of enthusiasm, McDonald explores the curiosities of the big blue planet we call home as well as our galactic neighbors-from Martian caves to storm clouds on Jupiter to the nebulae at the far end of the universe. So if you're pondering how to become an astronaut, or what dark matter really is, or how an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs, look no further. Through a captivating mix of stories and experiments, McDonald walks us through space exploration past and present, and reveals what we can look forward to in the future.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Astronomy, Audiobook, Space, Stem

Audio CD

Published February 18, 2020

Reviews

[Tracy · Rating 4 out of 5]

More a kids book than anything. I mostly already new quite a bit of the science in this. Quite a few fun experiments to do with a middle schooler interested in science. Might be fun to do while everyone is off due to the pandemic. It took me a while to read. I’ve been stress reading my news feed for news about Covid-19.

[Leah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting and educational. I did not like the end of chapter activities, felt very kiddish but it's forgivable.
This book skims the surface of everything from aliens, planets, milky way, black holes, the universe, speed of light, travelling in space, what space is like, what missions and satellites there have been, which countries have done what.

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was funny. This isn't. The product of a mediocre mind in the Church of Science. More, the nerve of the title is matched only by a very few religious preachers.

Inside, the current orthodoxy without much thought put in. Is there a "dark matter"? What is it? Is it just an error in the formulas humanity uses to calculate gravity? McDonald "knows" the same way Saint Augustine knows when the soul is installed by the Angelic Tech Inc into the provided fetus.

[Jason · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great for young people; a general collection of what we know so far about everything and more interestingly, what we don’t.

[Wendelle]

This book's unique feature is an array of kid-friendly crafts and experiment of hands-on science

[Bruce Harpham · Rating 4 out of 5]

I know of the author from his longstanding role at the CBC and many years of work in science journalism. In "An Earthling's Guide to Outer Space," McDonald makes space science and related topics very accessible. The book is structured in a question and answer format. As a result, you can easily read a few sections and come back to it when you like. As a bonus, McDonald includes a few Canadian details such as the Canadarm (a robot arm used in space work) and David Dunlap Observatory (located in Ontario, relatively close to Toronto).

The book also includes ideas for practical science experiments that can be done at home. From the way these passages are written, I think the experiment ideas are aimed at school students. There is plenty of excellent fodder there for students looking for science fair ideas.

This book is popular science done well.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very good introduction to basic questions about astronomy, physics, and the interesting ideas of outer space. As my good friend Carter knows, my space knowledge is very small. McDonald's clear writing and helpful metaphors helped complicated topics feel accessible. Though it's clear you aren't reading a deep text about astrophysics or rocket science, you're given enough information to operate with, and McDonald does not write in a way that makes you feel stupid. The short chapters also mean that you can easily refresh yourself on a topic or idea.

The experiments at the end of each chapter also make this a great resource for older children or parents, with simple experiments that demonstrate more complicated principles from the text.

I would recommend this book to my spouse Abby.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great beginner's guide to outer space

I enjoyed this book. Bob McDonald writes with a conversational tone`and greatly simplifies the science, so this is an excellent introduction to space exploration. McDonald covers a large amount of material but I never felt overloaded. While McDonald doesn’t cover anything that hasn’t been covered in many other books, his way of communicating made the book fun, although I did find the writing style a little simple. On the other hand, this may make the book suitable for younger readers. I recommend this book for anyone interested in space.
Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book via Netgalley for review purposes.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Aud) It was a nice easy listen. I've always enjoyed Mr.McDonalds radio shows on CBC; however, I tried listening to the entire book in one sitting and well...it was a bit much for one sitting. However, made it through in two sittings without too much trouble. My favourite take away was Humanity's complete failure to give our Moon an actual name. I'd seriously never thought about it before but McDonald makes a good point. Why do other planets have moons with wicked-cool names like Ganymede and Io and the best we can do (in the West) is refer to our Moon in Latin and pretend that's a name.

[Tyrie Mehaffey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVED this book. I did not previously know a lot about outer space and was just hoping to learn a thing or two about a new topic. It’s written for kids and is a quick read, but still had so much interesting and valuable information and most importantly, evoked a sense of awe and wonder. Isn’t that the goal of reading? I especially enjoyed the chapter that explained why Pluto is not a planet. My interest is piqued to read more in depth books about outer space; this was a fun place to start! Don’t listen to the haters who gave it one star.

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

On camping trips growing up, conversations around the campfire inevitably turned toward the night sky above us. In a lot of ways, this book captures the essence of those conversations about the universe and our place in it. The author's conversational tone makes the concepts easy to digest. This is a great jumping off point for anyone who wants to begin digging a little deeper into general astronomy.

[Bookm0l · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a very fun book talking about different ideas connected to Space no matter how easy or tough they may be. It’d say it’s more for primary school students. There’s a lot of DIY projects in it to visualise and contextualise the big ideas. Makes those things more connected to everyday life. I did like it. Some of the questions and the answers were really fascinating and clever but some were too obvious or something I already knew and, as I said, more for kids. Hence my 8/10✨

[Greg Hodgson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty basic but you'll pick up some cool facts about space.

[Hanna Carlina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good for my kid to learn about the scope of the galaxy...

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very informative and easy to understand for someone who knows little about outer space!

[Michelle Oag · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a great book. Perfect for a class or group reading because there are different experiments you can try.

[Kim · Rating 1 out of 5]

Didn't finish. Maybe good for kids?

[Katie Frewin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quick and easy read with interesting (though surface level) information on space

[Jonathan Pavan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Handful of interesting facts I did not know or had forgotten, liked all of Canadian content. But overall extremely light, and focused for more of a juvenile audience

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved it. Right up my alley. The chapters have a little science experiment at the end that simply show the concepts explained. Nothing too in depth but covers all the highlights.

[Tania · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a quick & easy palette cleanser kind of book on a subject I can’t get enough about!

[MARC L'ESPERANCE · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good read.

[Xerxia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn’t realize this was a children’s book when I downloaded it from the library but I’m not mad at all. Very enjoyable.

[Thureka · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book took me back to the days of watching Bob McDonald's Heads Up! on TV. Quick and informative, almost a Q&A style.

[Stefany · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very cute. Very Canadian. Very helpful in learning about our cosmos

[Noelle Walsh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed reading this book. It had a great conversational tone and is a great way to get introduced to various concepts of space. Anyone looking to learn at least someting about space or looking to introduce someone to space would do well to get this book in my opinion.

[Bethany]

This was sadly a lot more for kids than I thought when picking it up, and I'm just not in the mood.

[Josianne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Definitely appreciated the digestible language the author used to describe various aspects of space and space exploration! Enjoyed the humor included at times. My favourite sections had to be the "you try it" parts before the end of each chapter.



*Review posted on NetGalley*

[❆ Ash ❆ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Give it a listen if you like science! Dark matter, aliens, birth and death of stars, black holes, humans in space…and so much more!