Twenty Worlds: The Extraordinary Story of Planets Around Other Stars

Thirty years ago, the only planets we knew were the ones orbiting our own sun; we now know of thousands of other worlds orbiting distant stars. In this book, astronomer Niall Deacon journeys to twenty of these globes: from giant, blisteringly hot planets orbiting close to their parent stars to planets that float through the cold wilderness of space alone, and from dead stars shredding asteroids to worlds made of diamond—and even planets that may be similar to the Earth. Deacon also takes in...