Astronomer Andrew Fraknoi offers a tourist’s tour of the three realms of the cosmos, as astronomers understand it today: the planets and moons in the solar system, the stars and glowing gas clouds in the Milky Way, and the galaxies that make up the universe. Using the latest images from the largest telescopes in space and on our planet, we marvel at the colorful sights and alien vistas we can now explore. Along the way, we come to understand how different from Earth the other planets in our neighborhood really are, how stars shine and why they all eventually die, and how the big bang theory explains the organization and properties of the entire cosmos. We'll also take a look at the wonderful variety of alien planets that astronomers are discovering around other stars.