Rating: 
Summary: Great for the beginner. Really gets down to the basics.
Review: This book really takes you by the hand and leads you through some of the necessary basics for looking into the night sky while using a low power telescope. They make it relatively easy to locate some very nice deep sky objects and once you can find these you'll have a good basic idea of where a lot of these objects are and you can return again and again. A real confidence builder for the novice.
Rating:
Summary: Very useful to beginners.
Review: This book told me not only what to see, but where to find it with my eyes, see the exact location in the finder, and then what I should expect to see in the telescope.
Rating:
Summary: Turn Left at Orion
Review: This is a great book for a backyard astronomer. The pictures are how the object will look in a small telescope - not fancy large telescopes. It is written to be interesting for a young child or an adult. A great book for beginners. Buy it and enjoy it.
Rating:
Summary: Best book for the owner of a new telescope
Review: This is a great book for people that are new to observational astronomy, and who just purchased their first telescope. The book describes the best objects to view and gives instructions on how to find them. The book includes drawings of what the objects will look like through a 4" telescope as well as through the finderscope, so that you will know when you've found it! (Beautiful color pictures are fun to look at, but not much help when it comes to finding objects in the sky). Highly recommended for new amatuer astronomers.
Rating:
Summary: This book makes amateur astronomy much more rewarding.
Review: This is a truly good book. It has all the basics of astronomy as well as how to use a telescope. This book shows how a deep sky object will appear in the telescope, and not disappoint you when you see the image. Other books show Hubble space photos, which only frustrates an observer when an object doesn't look that good. The only thing bad about this book is: it makes me much more disappointed when it is cloudy! A must have for any telescope owner.
Rating:
Summary: New telescope? Start here!
Review: Too many amateur astronomy books are haughty, if not insulting, about the mass of small telescopes that people buy or receive as gifts. Sidebars like "Trash Scope Blues" are an example. This book, written by two professional astronomers, points out that the small telescope of today is the magnificent instrument beyond the dreams of Galileo or Messier*. With that foundation in place they proceed to lead you through the night sky to view the most interesting objects for small telescopes. They begin with the deepest coverage of the moon that I have encountered yet. There are separate sections for each phase of the moon detailing highlights of what is unique at that time of the month. Then they tour the night sky, season by season. Their directions to find items of interest don't presume that you know the constellations. Instead, in "Where to Look" they start with the bright, easy to find stars, and from there walk you over to the item. They assist your search by describing what you'll see in the finder scope and the telescope and have illustrations of what you will actually see in the telescope. (Not some picture taken by an observatory or the Hubble telescope.) In "Comments" they describe what you'll see, suggest the eyepiece to use to get the most of the view, and give details about just what that thing is. All objects are given a 1 to 4 telescope rating to help you choose the fun ones first. The Orion Nebula is an exception that receives a 5 telescope rating: easy to find, viewable in city light haze, with different interesting views at low and high power. Of the half dozen astronomy books I've looked over this is the hands down best book for the new owner of a telescope to have. More than any other book, it will help you get the most from your telescope. *Never heard of Messier? Most non-astronomers haven't Charles Messier hunted the skys for comets and kept coming across things that, at first glance, might be a comet. After figuring out that they weren't comets, he kept a record of them so he wouldn't waste time on them again. As it turns out this list contains some of the neatest things to see in the night sky.
Rating:
Summary: New telescope? Start here!
Review: Too many amateur astronomy books are haughty, if not insulting, about the mass of small telescopes that people buy or receive as gifts. Sidebars like "Trash Scope Blues" are an example. This book, written by two professional astronomers, points out that the small telescope of today is the magnificent instrument beyond the dreams of Galileo or Messier*. With that foundation in place they proceed to lead you through the night sky to view the most interesting objects for small telescopes. They begin with the deepest coverage of the moon that I have encountered yet. There are separate sections for each phase of the moon detailing highlights of what is unique at that time of the month. Then they tour the night sky, season by season. Their directions to find items of interest don't presume that you know the constellations. Instead, in "Where to Look" they start with the bright, easy to find stars, and from there walk you over to the item. They assist your search by describing what you'll see in the finder scope and the telescope and have illustrations of what you will actually see in the telescope. (Not some picture taken by an observatory or the Hubble telescope.) In "Comments" they describe what you'll see, suggest the eyepiece to use to get the most of the view, and give details about just what that thing is. All objects are given a 1 to 4 telescope rating to help you choose the fun ones first. The Orion Nebula is an exception that receives a 5 telescope rating: easy to find, viewable in city light haze, with different interesting views at low and high power. Of the half dozen astronomy books I've looked over this is the hands down best book for the new owner of a telescope to have. More than any other book, it will help you get the most from your telescope. *Never heard of Messier? Most non-astronomers haven't Charles Messier hunted the skys for comets and kept coming across things that, at first glance, might be a comet. After figuring out that they weren't comets, he kept a record of them so he wouldn't waste time on them again. As it turns out this list contains some of the neatest things to see in the night sky.
Rating: 
Summary: The authors' bad-mouthing reflectors is inexcusable
Review: When I checked this book out of a library, as I read each & every deep-sky entry, the very 1st thing I did as I turned the page was cover up the wrong and misleading sketches. OK, some people are satisfied with toy telescopes (including 16" SCT's) that are "left" (pun) to give backward images, but don't bad-mouth reflectors & other astronomic telescopes while you're at it. There are roof and dovetail prisms available that give a proper left- to right image, you just have to search to find quality diagonals of this nature.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding for Amateurs!
Review: When we bought our Meade telescope (see my review of that), we bought only two books: this one, and Nightwatch (see my review of that). Both books were EXCELLENT. You'll never know about some of the fascinating night-sky objects if you don't get a book. This book has been a huge help in finding objects, understanding what we're viewing and appreciating to different objects in the sky. I strongly recommend Nightwatch as well.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding for Amateurs!
Review: When we bought our Meade telescope (see my review of that), we bought only two books: this one, and Nightwatch (see my review of that). Both books were EXCELLENT. You'll never know about some of the fascinating night-sky objects if you don't get a book. This book has been a huge help in finding objects, understanding what we're viewing and appreciating to different objects in the sky. I strongly recommend Nightwatch as well.
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