Majestic universe Views from here to infinity

This oversized coffee-table book includes more than 200 astronomical photographs (mostly of objects beyond the solar system), many of them taken by Brunier, a professional photographer in addition to being chief editor of the journal Ciel et Espace. The large format is actually a drawback, making the book difficult to hold and leading to many of the photographs being so highly enlarged that they appear blurry. For a book in which images play such an important role, it is unfortunate that there is so little information on how they were obtained. Only a single page of credits is offered, which does not generally specify even the telescope used--and the integration of the images with text is weak. Although there are minor errors, the book supplies an unusually knowledgeable overview of cutting-edge astronomical research, with references to results as recent as mid-1999. The writing (translated from the original French) is sometimes ponderous and breathless but is generally clear and understandable to a nonspecialist. It is impossible to strongly recommend this book, but it would be of some value to libraries wishing to update their collection of introductory astronomy books. General readers; undergraduates. T. Barker; Wheaton College (MA)