Unlocking the Universe: The Cosmic Discoveries of the Webb Space Telescope
by Suzanne Slade
Primary, Intermediate    Charlesbridge    48 pp.
10/24    9781623544591    $17.99
e-book ed.  9781632894083    $9.99

The James Webb Space Telescope is the latest “great observatory” collecting data on distant galaxies and stars from a position orbiting Earth. Slade skillfully explains NASA’s decades-long and at times precarious process of designing, building, launching, and operating the telescope. The focus is mainly on the technical aspects of the engineering project, but there is also helpful consideration of the political and financial costs of keeping a complex technology project aloft. Abundant photographs of the people, machines, and facilities involved illustrate the telescope, with its distinctive hexagonal mirrors, under construction; the rocket launch into orbit; and then the payoff: crisp, striking images that show never-before-seen objects and give new details about familiar stars and nebulae. Excellent, in-depth captions provide valuable information, in particular when describing which data is accessed to produce each space image. The back matter provides schematics, information about historical space telescopes, and resources for further reading.

From the ">January/February 2025 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.