How Dense Is the Sun? Can the Sun Still Be Burning? Heading up his chapters and subchapters with such basic questions, Gallant goes on to reason out answers, step by simple step, sometimes telling how ""you"" can take the measurements involved. Having made readers acquainted with our nearest star, the second half of the book looks beyond, to ""The Stuff of Stars,"" how they are formed, and how they ""go out."" Supernovae, pulsars, black holes, and other stages of stars are as clearly described. Though Gallant includes some equations and diagrams, this is less prepossessing than Asimov's Alpha Centauri and To the Ends of the Universe (both 1976), though less dramatic and exciting than Branley's Black Holes, White Dwarfs, and Superstars (1976). Should be useful.