Cambridge Star Atlas

If you are looking for an easy to use star atlas then this is the only one you will need. It is so clearly laid out and easy to use it’s incredible. I can’t rate it highly enough.

Some people may prefer laminated pages, so they can be wiped clean, these are not. But this Star Atlas was designed for outdoor use though, it is spiral bound making it really easy to open out and turn back on its self.

The Cambridge Star Atlas contains a really good lunar map as well. The lunar features in the book are displayed in alphabetical order and in numerical order as they appear on the moon’s surface. The moon maps are also shown in mirror reversed order, as you would view it through an eyepiece.

The constellations are then shown for both the northern and southern latitudes across the various seasons. From here you then drill down into closer views of the constellations, which have page numbers watermarked on them, this denotes which page to jump to in order to see that part of the sky in full detail.

This star atlas also contains a handy list of the Messier objects, a list of the 96 brightest stars and also a list of the constellations.
At the rear of the book there are a number of pages showing all sky maps, the first one shows the constellations, then a distribution of open clusters, globular clusters, diffuse nebula, planetary nebulae and the distribution of galaxies.

The final table in the book contains a list of Exoplanets or extrasolar planets.

Overall this is a brilliant book, if you are looking for a Star Atlas or if you are bored of looking at a planetarium program on a computer screen to find your way around the night sky then buy this book, you won’t regret it.

The Cambridge Star Atlas is available at Waterstones