“Death by Black Hole” by Neil DeGrasse Tyson
Just like how I found out about “2012: The Return of Quetzacoatl” by Daniel Pinchbeck, I saw an interview with Neil on an episode of The Colbert Report, where he was promoting this new book, "Death by Black Hole: And Other Cosmic Quandaries". I can’t recall how long ago the episode had played, but I immediately added it to my ‘to read’ list after watching it. It wasn’t until about two weeks ago that I found a copy in my local Chapters and started reading.
I hate to offer a negative side to any review of this book, because it really was quite fascinating and readable, but also much like Pinchbeck’s novel which I reviewed a few weeks ago, it was slightly different than I had originally thought it to be. Beyond those two little tidbits, the two books really have nothing in common. My only gripe with "Death By Black Hole" is that it is a little bit more introductory than I expected it to be, although my complaints don’t stretch any further than that.
I really was expecting the book to be a little bit more in depth and more about the true "quandaries" of the universe. The book has "black hole" right in it’s title, and those little (rather, huge) mysteries I’ve had great interest in. I was a little disappointed that only a relatively small portion of the book covered black holes themselves.
Having just finished a course in school entitled "Life Beyond Earth", quite a bit of information in the first third of the book was a review of a lot of the topics and ideas I had just learned about. What might otherwise have been an unnecessary and boring review was turned around by Mr. Tyson’s excellent ability to capture the reader and offer a quarky side to astrophysics. Even relearning a lot the things I had studied so hard for over the last year in my course (basic existence and formation of stars, galaxies, planets, lagrangian points, etc), he was still able to make it refreshing and interesting.
One of the things I liked about the format of the book, which I might otherwise have found rather annoying, was the multiple-essays-stuck-together form. While transitions between chapters (essays) weren’t perfect for the reader going front to back — there was a bit of overlap and repetition — having it in this form will allow me to head back to the book again and again, and reread or reference the parts of the book I found most interesting and enjoyable.
Some of the more interesting topics from the book I found to be were the interaction between matter and antimatter; some of the insights into the different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum; and formation and lifetimes of stars. The section that surprised me the most, however, was entitled "Science and Culture" where Neil DeGrasse Tyson some of the oft misinterpreted or just completely missed topics and news of astrophysics. Most of this section seemed to me more about his personal, anecdotal experience, it was an interesting way to finish the book, alongside the "Science and God" section.
Overall, it was an extremely well written, capturing book. It’s a great reference and starting point as a brief look into some of the most interesting aspects of astrophysics and cosmology. And although I expected it to be a little bit more in-depth and less introductory, it still offered me a great overview of other topics in the field that I can look at a little deeper independently.