... stark, bewitching ... The merciless seesaw of [Seager's] grief makes for harrowing reading ... The second half of her story gleams with insights into what it means to lose a partner in midlife, and just as the widows helped Seager feel less alone, her story is sure to help any readers grappling with a similar loss ... Seager’s [prose] is rawer and starker, full of blues and blacks, written in the ink of grief, suffering, healing and — ultimately — clarity. In Seager’s hands you’re as apt to learn about 'a special body bag that’s designed to slide down stairs' as about storm-wracked rogue exoplanets where it rains molten iron ... beautifully dramatize[s] the emotional precarity of having one’s career pinned to the fate of space hardware ... address[es] the challenges of being female physical scientists in a male-dominated field, and convey[s] the struggle of operating in the vast scales of the universe at work, then commuting home to operate in the humbler scales of the domestic sphere ... [Seager] exemplifies the humanity of science.
Sara Seager is revealed to be an astute practitioner of metaphor as both a form of reasoning and illustration as well as a source of artful emotional resonance. So thoroughly, in fact, is this memoir steeped in metaphor and analogy, a proper reference point for Seager’s style not that of Humboldt or Sagan, for whom an analogy is drawn up periodically to establish a particular point, but rather that of Charles Darwin, for whom analogy is found to be at the root of his entire system of thought ... she is handling two distinct areas of engagement: the science part, and the emotions part. Both are revealed throughout in beautiful passages and images ... Seager endows these experiences with emotion and poignancy using an idiosyncratic but accessible and resonant metaphorical language.
eager shares a passion for the universe so deep that even this reviewer, a physics dunce, could grasp why she would spend her life gazing toward other planets. Analytical yet lyrical, Seager’s memoir is an examination of the parallels between searching for new life in the multiverse and starting over with a new life on Earth—the sort of connection only an astrophysicist might make.
[Seager] describes frankly and honestly how autism impedes the brain’s ability to emotionally inflect speech ... What makes Seager’s book both scientifically fascinating and memorable as a personal story, however, is that her drive and passion for scientific progress is entwined with the challenges of being a parent and the trauma of losing her first husband Mike to cancer while their children were still young and her career was accelerating ... Perhaps Sara Seager’s greatest accomplishment in The Smallest Lights in the Universe is that she doesn’t simply interleave stories of her own beginnings, her family life, her grief and the remarkable women who shared it into her scientific career. Instead, she has created a compelling narrative counterpoint, a kind of prose fugue in which all the facets, the voices, of her life co-create the whole. This is a book that I both felt and heard, as so many of its 'smallest lights' took on substance and wonder.
This thoughtful and affecting memoir of navigating life after loss reads like a comforting novel, inspiring others to follow their dreams and never give up on the possibilities of discovery and self-reflection. Readers seeking women’s biographies and studies in planetary science will relish this heartfelt story.
The memoir of an astrophysicist whose extraordinary accomplishments reflect her exceptional complexity ... [Seager's] prominence and how she achieved it would merit a book about her, but her personal struggles fitting in and finding a balance between her work and life are what make this memoir so compelling, even for readers who know little about science ... Seager also engagingly explores how a widows’ group that she was reluctant to join showed her that she was not alone and how finding her second husband opened a whole new world within her. The interior journey she traces here is as extraordinary as her scientific career ... A singular scientist has written a singular account of her life and work.
... brilliant, emotionally wrought ... Seager’s openhearted prose is clean and exact, and her observations illuminate the human drive to connect with others. This wondrous tale of discovery, loss, and love is both expansive intimate.
This engaging memoir seamlessly weaves together three narratives ... It doesn’t matter whether the text is describing a particularly painful social interaction or explaining the mechanics behind a billion-dollar proposal; Seager’s writing is unfailingly accessible and compelling. Sometimes the chapters alternate between biographical and scientific developments, other times events are intertwined, but again, readers will remain fully engaged throughout. They’ll appreciate Seager’s honesty and empathize with her as she describes the agony of watching her husband being consumed by cancer, vents frustration over professional setbacks and snubs, or shares her hard-won victories. This is technical writing at its best, shared by a thoroughly companionable and relatable scientist, writer, and woman. Readers will cheer for the happy ending.
