**A "thrilling adventure story" (San Francisco Chronicle) that brings
to life the astronomers who in the 1700s embarked upon a quest to
calculate the size of the solar system, and paints a vivid portrait of
the collaborations, rivalries, and volatile international politics that
hindered them at every turn. - From the author of Magnificent Rebels
and New York Times bestseller *The Invention of Nature.
On June 6, 1761, the world paused to observe a momentous occasion: the
first transit of Venus between the Earth and the Sun in more than a
century. Through that observation, astronomers could calculate the size
of the solar system--but only if they could compile data from many
different points of the globe, all recorded during the short period of
the transit. Overcoming incredible odds and political strife,
astronomers from Britain, France, Russia, Germany, Sweden, and the
American colonies set up observatories in the remotest corners of the
world, only to be thwarted by unpredictable weather and warring armies.
Fortunately, transits of Venus occur in pairs; eight years later, they
would have another opportunity to succeed.
Thanks to these scientists, neither our conception of the universe nor
the nature of scientific research would ever be the same.
