Guy Ottewell’s Astronomical Calendar 2024 is here

Beloved British astronomer Guy Ottewell announced his Astronomical Calendar 2024 is out and ready for purchase. Reprinted with permission. Edits by EarthSky.

The popular Astronomical Calendar

Guy Ottewell’s Astronomical calendar is well-known and popular among amateur astronomers. Previously, it was available in printed form from 1974 to 2016, and used by thousands of sky-lovers in more than 100 countries. Later, after 2016, the Astronomical Calendar was released in an electronic format. Luckily for book lovers, last year Guy started releasing it in both printed and electronic formats.

The 2024 release has 141 pages, with hundreds of illustrations, including charts and 3-D views of space. For each month there are six pages, with about 50 events, a sky dome, and a diagram showing where the planets are in their orbits. Plus, there are about 20 of the most interesting sky scenes for that month.

Also, after the monthly section, there are several sections on the sun and seasons, the moon, eclipses, occultations, each planet, asteroids and meteor showers. Guy offers a full explanation of the main features, and a glossary of terms.

About the Astronomical Calendar 2024

The Astronomical Calendar 2024 in printed form is handy for using as a typical reference book. On the dates when there is a meteor shower or an opposition of a planet like Jupiter, you can find more detailed information in the section on the planets or the meteors showers. Also, there is detailed information and charts enabling you to visualize the globe during for the eclipses in 2024.

As for the electronic book, the advantage to that format is that you can zoom in to see the illustrations in exquisite detail, and magnitfy them to full resolution. Plus it’s easy to search the file for a specific term.

About the cover illustration

The 2024 cover picture story is the myth of an in-prisoned princess Danae, who gave birth to Perseus, a son of Zeus who appeared to her in a golden shower.

What are others saying about the Astronomical Calendar?

Philip Morrison of Scientific American said:

The large Ottewell calendar deserves pride of place … a work of kinematics-made-vivid… a piece of original samizdat … its author is a gifted artist … to his talented brush, his sense of form in space, and his apt and pithy choice of words, he has added a deft hand at the computer keyboard.

And a reader in New Hampshire commented:

My husband just cries if he doesn’t find it under the Christmas tree …

Plus a professor in California wrote:

I found enough in the budget to buy 10 for our class. I don’t believe we could make it without them. It’s an amazing amount of information for so little money.

Bottom line: Guy Ottewell’s popular and beloved Astronomical Calendar is out for 2024. You can get it in electronic or printed form. Amateur astronomers everywhere look forward to its annual release.

Read more at Goy Ottewell’s blog