Here is a useful tidbit of information: if you’re stargazing in the city, you can see about 300 stars, but in the country, you can see about 3,500! With The New Astronomer, you can learn how to become an avid stargazer with guidance from astronomer Carole Stott, whether you’re in the city or the country. Beginning with a brief explanation of the night sky, the author moves on to introduce readers to equipment, from low-tech binoculars to a CCD camera and its detector—a silicon chip about the size of a postage stamp. Hi-tech or low-tech, a stargazer still needs a map, and New Astronomer provides a planisphere, a simple, flat, circular map of the stars. Once your equipment is in place, flip to the blue-edged pages and you can start examining our solar system. Stott gives quick facts for each planet, the Moon and the Sun; a locator map good until 2010; and almost best of all, images of what the planets look like to the naked eye, through binoculars, a telescope, and a CCD image. Of course, there’s more to the solar system than our close planetary neighbours. As a stargazer you can explore meteors, comets, asteroids, and satellites. Stott takes readers even further. Turn to the green-edged pages and travel the celestial sphere. Cut a swath through the zodiac! Never wonder again how to find the North Star (Polaris)! Bathe your eyes in a meteor shower!

(Originally published in the July/Aug 2001 issue of YES Mag.)