Radio Universe Audiobook By Emma Chapman cover art

Radio Universe

How to Explore Space Without Leaving Earth
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Radio Universe

By: Emma Chapman
Narrated by: Emma Chapman
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Pre-order for $24.92

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How do you explore distant stars, buried water on Mars or the first moments after the Big Bang - without leaving your back garden?

In The Radio Universe, award-winning astrophysicist Emma Chapman takes us on an electrifying voyage through the cosmos using one of the most powerful, yet overlooked, tools in science: the radio wave. With dazzling clarity and humour, Chapman reveals how these invisible messengers glide through space, bounce off planets, tunnel through clouds and slip past galactic dust - carrying secrets of the universe that no other kind of light can uncover.

We follow a single radio wave as it escapes Earth and travels outward - ricocheting off the Moon, tunnelling through Venus's furnace-thick atmosphere, tracing ancient ice hidden in Mercury's shadows and diving deep into the swirling arms of the Milky Way. Along the way, we meet black holes that roar louder than stars, pulsars more precise than atomic clocks and galaxies lit by the very first starlight. We explore volcanic pancake planets, death-defying neutron stars, the eerie possibility of alien broadcasts - and the fragile question of our own future in the cosmos.

A celebration of human ingenuity and cosmic curiosity, The Radio Universe reveals that the true frontier of space isn't 'out there' - it's humming quietly all around us, waiting to be heard.©2026 Emma Chapman Astronomy Astronomy & Space Science Cosmology Earth Sciences Physics Science

Critic reviews

Astrophysicist Emma Chapman's Radio Universe reveals how we use radio waves to explore the distant universe. Chapman follows one on a journey from Earth into the wider Milky Way, passing black holes and pulsars
PRAISE FOR FIRST LIGHT, BY EMMA CHAPMAN
A dispatch from the frontiers of science, from a brain fizzing with ideas and energy (Chris Lintott, BBC Sky at Night)
An illuminating and entertaining look at the earliest stars of our cosmos. Chapman is a witty and straightforward guide, and her enthusiasm is infectious
Thoroughly engaging . . . allows us to see science in the making. Chapman serves as a wonderful guide, whose voice is reminiscent of Carl Sagan's, although with an extra and very welcome dollop of impish humor
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