The Ann Arbor District Library invites you to join our online discussion of the 2009 Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads title Seeing In The Dark: How Amateur Astronomers Are Discovering The Wonders Of The Universe, by Timothy Ferris. 2009 marks the International Year of Astronomy and the 400th anniversary of the first astronomical observation through a telescope by Galileo. Here are a few questions to get the discussion rolling: Have you ever seen a really dark, starry night? What did you think about and how did you feel? What was the first object you saw through a telescope that got you hooked on observing the night sky? Compare viewing the sky through a telescope versus seeing it with the naked eye. Add your comments below.
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Should government continue to support science?
And another new question: Why, as a species, do we need night?

This is one of three titles under consideration for this year's Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, which will focus on the theme The Universe: Yours To Discover. What did you think of this book? Tell us!

With her blockbuster New York Times bestsellers Longitude and Galileo’s Daughter, Dava Sobel used her rare and luminous gift for weaving difficult scientific concepts into a compelling story to garner rave reviews and attract readers from across the literary spectrum. Now, in The Planets, Sobel brings her full talents to bear on what is perhaps her most ambitious subject to date—the planets of our solar system.

The sun’s family of planets becomes a familiar place in this personal account of the lives of other worlds. Sobel explores the planets’ origins and oddities through the lens of popular culture, from astrology, mythology, and science fiction to art, music, poetry, biography, and history. A perfect gift and a captivating journey, The Planets is a gorgeously illustrated study of our place in the universe that will mesmerize everyone who has ever gazed with awe at our night sky.

In Seeing in the Dark, a poetic love letter to science and to the skies, Timothy Ferris invites us all to become stargazers. He recounts his own experiences as an enthralled lifelong amateur astronomer and reports from around the globe -- from England and Italy to the Florida Keys and the Chilean Andes -- on the revolution that's putting millions in touch with the night sky. In addition, Ferris offers an authoritative and engaging report on what's out there to be seen -- what Saturn, the Ring nebula, the Silver Coin galaxy, and the Virgo supercluster really are and how to find them. The appendix includes star charts, observing lists, and a guide on how to get involved in astronomy.

Ferris takes us inside a major revolution sweeping astronomy, as lone amateur astronomers, in global networks linked by the Internet, make important discoveries that are the envy of the professionals. His ability to describe the wonders of the universe is simply magical, and his enthusiasm for his subject is irresistible.

This is one of three titles under consideration for this year's Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, which will focus on the theme The Universe: Yours To Discover. What did you think of this book? Tell us!

A number-one New York Times bestseller in mass market, brought to the screen in the acclaimed film "October Sky," Rocket Boys was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award. It was also selected by the New York Times as one of its "Great Books of 1998" and was an alternate "Book-of-the-Month" selection for both the Literary Guild and Doubleday book clubs.

With the grace of a natural storyteller Homer Hickam looks back after a distinguished NASA career to tell his own true story of growing up in a dying coal town and of how, against the odds, he made his dreams of launching rockets into outer space come true. One of the most beloved bestsellers in recent years, this powerful, luminous, American story of coming of age at the end of the 1950s, is the story of a mother's love, a father's fears, and a young boy’s experience of growing up and getting out. A story of romance and loss and a keen portrait of life at an extraordinary point in American history, it is a chronicle of triumph.

This is one of three titles under consideration for this year's Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, which will focus on China and America: Bridging Two Worlds.

From the remarkable Ha Jin, winner of the National Book Award for his celebrated novel Waiting, The Bridegroom: Stories is a collection of comical and deeply moving tales of contemporary China that are as warm and human as they are surprising, disturbing, and delightful.

This is one of three titles under consideration for this year's Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, which will focus on China and America: Bridging Two Worlds.

In the best tradition of The Color of Water comes a beautifully written evocative memoir of a relationship between a mother and son – and the Chinese immigrant experience.

This is one of three titles under consideration for this year's Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, which will focus on China and America: Bridging Two Worlds.

Red Azalea is Anchee Min’s celebrated memoir of growing up in the last years of Mao’s China. As a child, she was asked to publicly humiliate a teacher; at seventeen, she was sent to work at a labor collective. Forbidden to speak, dress, read, write, or love as she pleased, she found a lifeline in a secret love affair with another woman.

This is one of three titles under consideration for this year's Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, which will focus on We The People… - the many people that we are, the diverse communities we have created, and the challenges we face in fostering a continuing sense of belonging and civic engagement in a rapidly changing world.

Sarah Vowell travels through the American past and, in doing so, investigates the dusty, bumpy roads of her own life. In this insightful and funny collection of personal stories Vowell — widely hailed for her inimitable narratives on public radio's This American Life — ponders a number of curious questions: Why is she happiest when visiting the sites of bloody struggles like Salem or Gettysburg? Why do people always inappropriately compare themselves to Rosa Parks? Why is a bad life in sunny California so much worse than a bad life anywhere else? What is it about the Zen of foul shots? And, in the title piece, why must doubt and internal arguments haunt the sleepless nights of the true patriot?

What did you think of this book? Tell us!

This powerful and inspiring new book shows how one person can make a difference, as Pulitzer Prize-winning author Tracy Kidder tells the true story of a gifted man who is in love with the world and has set out to do all he can to cure it.

Paul Farmer is a doctor, Harvard professor, renowned infectious-disease specialist, anthropologist and the recipient of a MacArthur "genius" grant. In medical school, he found his life's calling: to diagnose and cure infectious diseases and to bring the lifesaving tools of modern medicine to those who need them most.

The book shows how radical change can be fostered in situations that seem insurmountable, and how a meaningful life can be created, as Farmer--brilliant, charismatic, charming, both a leader in international health and a doctor who finds time to make house calls in Boston and the mountains of Haiti--blasts through convention to get results.

Mountains Beyond Mountains takes us from Harvard to Haiti, Peru, Cuba, and Russia as Farmer changes minds and practices through his dedication to the philosophy that "the only real nation is humanity" - a philosophy that is embodied in the small public charity he founded, Partners In Health. He enlists the help of the Gates Foundation, George Soros, the U.N.'s World Health Organization, and others in his quest to cure the world. At the heart of this book is the example of a life based on hope, and on an understanding of the truth of the Haitian proverb "Beyond mountains there are mountains": as you solve one problem, another problem presents itself, and so you go on and try to solve that one too.

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This is one of three titles under consideration for this year's Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, which will focus on We The People… - the many people that we are, the diverse communities we have created, and the challenges we face in fostering a continuing sense of belonging and civic engagement in a rapidly changing world.

In Better Together, bestselling author Robert Putnam and longtime civic activist Lewis Feldstein describe some of the diverse locations and most compelling ways in which civic renewal is taking place today. In response to civic crises and local problems, they say, hardworking, committed people are reweaving the social fabric all across America, often in innovative ways that may turn out to be appropriate for the twenty-first century.

What did you think of this book? Tell us!