The story of our Universe, from its beginning in the first milliseconds of the Big Bang up to our present moment and beyond, told in a gripping narrative by one of the world's leading astronomers. Our knowledge of the Universe is greater than ever thanks to cutting-edge scientific research, as well as a new age of space exploration and discovery, and Paul Murdin has been at the forefront of this inquiry--he was the first person to identify a black hole. In The Universe, Murdin draws on his expertise in the field to explain difficult concepts such as black holes, nebulae, and dark matter and relates them to the most important characters and events in the history of our Universe: powerful explosions, the largest planets, galaxies, and celestial bodies. Structured in a clear, accessible fashion as a "biography" of our Universe, this history begins at the Big Bang and proceeds stage by stage through the story of our cosmos. Full of fascinating details about our own existence, for instance that two-thirds of the atoms in our body are hydrogen atoms formed in the first few minutes of the Big Bang, and that we are a by-product of the manufacture of galaxies and stars, this volume offers a glimpse into the future of our Universe and what it means to us all.