The Mystery: Unbelievable Universe

New feature: I will be posting regularly whenever I come across something that to me hints at The Mystery, those wonderful and inexplicable things in this world that confound and fascinate us all; or as I wrote about in another post, The Mystery is that wandering spark of the transcendent that we all glimpse from time to time.

So this post doesn't have a lot to do with publishing, however, I've been neck-deep in a new and unique (at least for me) book project that has been endlessly fascinating.

This new book, when it's complete, will feature some of the more astounding images of galaxies and nebulae, stars and planets, along with a myriad of phenomena from all over the universe and taken from various earth-bound sources and others including the Hubble Telescope.

In the process of doing the dirty work putting this book together, e-mailing back and forth with a former NASA astronaut, dealing with securing image rights here and there, working with the authors, and then editing some of the content as well, I stopped and looked hard at these images. Somewhere in the middle of it all, I just took it all in and wow is all I can say.

Every time I look at them, I feel very small.

There's a staggering sense of wonder that hits you as you look at what's "out there" and try to figure it all out, or fit the scope of it all in your head. Dig the following images, for example:



*This image looks so sci-fi I can't stand it. This is a dying star is known as NGC 6302, or the Bug Nebula. The gases race away from the center of the nebula at over 600,000 miles per hour. (above)



*This image of a radical-looking mountain of dust and gas rising from the Carina Nebula, is apparently a 3-light-year-tall pillar of hydrogen. How do they know that? (above)



* This picture just doesn't even figure into my world at all, it's just difficult to process. The object is a Red Supergiant Star called V838 Monocerotis, and apparently this image shows "light echoes." Basically, this star flashed back in 2002 and we got these crazy photos to prove it. (above)

Anyway, so I just thought I'd share some of what I'd been working on—and this is just a hint of what it will become. I'll put up a post at some point when this book hits bookstores in six months or so.

And by the way, you can find hundreds and thousands more similar images that are just as mind-blowing (and better) at: www.nasaimages.org or www.hubblesite.org!