Cosmos

Written by astronomer Carl Sagan alongside the PBS series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, the book has 13 illustrated chapters, one for each episode. Sagan sets out to explain complex science to any interested reader, tracing the long course of cosmic evolution alongside the way science and civilization grew up together. Figures from Democritus, Hypatia and Kepler to Newton, Huygens and Champollion appear beside the Library of Alexandria, spacecraft sent to nearby planets, the human brain, how life began, the Sun's eventual end and the danger of nuclear war. Sagan argues that the universe is vast enough for many civilizations but finds no credible evidence of alien visits. It received a Hugo Award in the category for nonfiction books.

It is one of the titles on Richard Branson's World Book Day list of his top 65 lifetime reads.