Dava Sobel, a former New York Times science reporter, is the author of LONGITUDE, GALILEO'S DAUGHTER and LETTERS TO FATHER. In her 30 years as a science journalist, she has written for many magazines, and co-authored six books, including IS ANYONE OUT THERE? with astronomer Frank Drake and THE ILLUSTRATED LONGITUDE with William J. H. Andrews. Sobel has been awarded the National Science Board’s pretigious Individual Public Service Award, the Bradford Washburn Award from the Boston Museum of Science, and the Harrison Medal from the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers.

Books by Dava Sobel

The Glass Universe: How the Ladies of the Harvard Observatory Took the Measure of the Stars

by Dava Sobel - History, Nonfiction, Science

In the mid-19th century, the Harvard College Observatory began employing women as calculators, or “human computers,” to interpret the observations their male counterparts made via telescope each night. As photography transformed the practice of astronomy, the ladies turned from computation to studying the stars captured nightly on glass photographic plates. The “glass universe” of half a million plates that Harvard amassed over the ensuing decades enabled the women to make extraordinary discoveries that attracted worldwide acclaim.

The Planets

by Dava Sobel - Nonfiction, Science

Letters to Father: Suor Maria Celeste to Galileo, 1623–1633

translated and annotated by Dava Sobel - Nonfiction

Galileo's Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith and Love

by Dava Sobel - Biography, Nonfiction