Rebel Star

Our Quest to Solve the Great Mysteries of the Sun

By: Colin Stuart

Narrated by: Bruce Mann

A fascinating and comprehensive guide to the sun - our home star - and why understanding it is pivotal to our future existence here on Earth.

In 1869, a great mystery was born. As astronomers observed a total solar eclipse, for the first time they saw the faint glow of the solar corona, the sun's outer atmosphere. Measurements of a previously unknown wavelength that made up this solar light sparked hot debate among scientists, but it was another 60 years before they discovered that this wavelength was in fact iron being burned at a staggering three million degrees Celsius. With the sun's surface only 6,000 degrees, this shouldn't be possible. What we now knew about the sun appeared to defy the laws of physics - and nature.

But as well as being shrouded in intriguing mystery, the unpredictable nature of the sun's corona poses a serious threat to our life here on earth - the destructive potential of solar storms, caused by solar material traveling out into space at around one million miles an hour, is huge. Remaining beyond our reach until now, a new generation of ambitious solar missions are currently traveling closer to the sun than any previous spacecraft in history. As we enter this unprecedented era of heliophysics, there has never been a better time to get to grips with the workings of our home star.

©2019 Michael O’Mara Books Ltd (P)2019 Tantor

Great book, bored narrator

This is a well written, fascinating book. So fascinating that it sustained me through a narrator who sounded thoroughly bored by the subject.
One could be charitable and say the voice was sardonic. But someone, somewhere in the process of casting and recording should have put a halt to this near book(killing, terminal, stoned, British android.
If you imagine Stephen Fry and take away all the inflection, wit and enthusiastism, you're still a long way better than this narration.
For the sake of the author and the audience, this book should be recorded using a person with an actual pulse. I'd say the narration was slightly better than text-to-speech; if it actually was.
The book itself is well paced, pitched just right in terms of detail and understandability. So good in fact that it still becomes a worthwhile, satisfying purchase.