A Black Hole is not a Hole

A Black Hole is Not a Hole
by Carolyn Cinami DeCristofano
Charlesbridge, 2012. 74 pgs. Non-fiction.

Fascinating and funny, DeCristofano's text takes us through the discovery and attributes of black holes from soup to nuts, as they say, explaining what black holes seem like, but aren't (holes, whirlpools), to what they are (extreme gravity zones). Some familiar things are covered here, such as what would happen to your body as you slipped through the event horizon--scientists call it "spaghettification" (not kidding)--but did you know that the data suggest that the universe might contain black holes as small as pinpricks? or that the singularity at the heart of a black hole contains the entire mass of a collapsed star? What an interesting book, readily accessible to most children from, say, fourth grade on up--and to their elders.

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