Recommend me some cloudy night Cosmology books please. (an experiment in causality)

[SiriusB]

Hi all,

           "I am specialising in the universe and all that surrounds it" ~  Att. Peter Cook

(Sorry ,couldn't help throwing that one in, it tickled me.)

           I used to keep up with developments in Cosmology way back in the 80's /90's..

.but  that's a long time ago now, time to get back up to speed.

Any recommendations for a reasonably up to date read on current cosmological thinking & research please? ~Aimed more for the layman than those with a PhD. 😉

For a bonus point, anyone recommend a good laymans guide to Quantum Physics?

All a bit of a causality experiment really.

If buying Astronomical equipment leads to cloudy skies, maybe some theoretical reading material will arrive with an abundance of clear nights & no time to read them?

Either way, it's a win-win situation.

Thanks in anticipation.

 

[vlaiv]

Not literature per se, but series of lectures. Look up Leonard Susskind's lecture series called "Theoretical minimum" on Youtube. Actually - it is a book that he wrote, but he also recorded his lectures.

They are aimed at undergraduate students to provide them with theoretical minimum needed to read further literature on particular topics.

Here is playlist on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL6i60qoDQhQGaGbbg-4aSwXJvxOqO6o5e

you can select lectures of interest - like cosmology or QM basics.

[DirkSteele]

I reviewed this for Astronomy Now a few years ago and it was a very enjoyable read. Despite having a masters in astrophysics it was never needed and just quite frankly an exciting read thanks to the writing style.