Star Gazing, Comet Tracking, and Sky Mapping

School Library Journal

Gr 5-8 Berger divides his material into three sections. ``Star Gazing'' gives a sky map for each month, showing positions of 30 Northern Hemisphere constellations as seen from 40 north latitude at 9 vp.m. on the 16th of the month. Each constellation is described in the month in which it is highest in the sky. Berger gives the legendary sources of constellation names and mentions an occasional highly visible nebula or double star. There is also a separate diagram of each constellation, showing the figure it represents and pointing out which are its two brightest stars, but unless they are of the first magnitude, there is no indication of how bright they are. ``Comet Tracking'' describes comets and how to search for unknown ones and gives a diagram of where to look for Halley's Comet from January 5 through April 25, 1986. It also lists major meteor showers, tells how best to observe meteors and how and where to report observations in order to add to the world's knowledge. ``Sky Mapping'' continues this theme, describing how to refine observations. Berger offers more detail on constellations but fewer types of phenomena than Branley's Sun Dogs and Shooting Stars: a Skywatcher's Calendar (Houghton, 1980). Both Berger and Branley treat primarily unaided eye observations in a solid, black-and-white, read-the-text-with-help-from-diagrams way, in contrast to Snowden's full-color, look-at-the-pictures-first approach for binocular and small telescope observations in The Young Astronomer (Usborne, 1982; o.p.). Margaret L. Chatham, formerly at Smithtown Library, N.Y.