***Please note: This event has been rescheduled from August 2 to August 25, 2022***

The Morrill Memorial Library is partnering with the Tewksbury Public Library and other MLN libraries to host a summer series of virtual author talks. On Thursday, August 25 at 7:00pm, join us on Zoom for "Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth," by Avi Loeb, bestselling author of the recent, critically acclaimed book Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth.

Harvard’s top astronomer lays out his controversial theory that our solar system was recently visited by advanced alien technology from a distant star. In late 2017, scientists at a Hawaiian observatory glimpsed an object soaring through our inner solar system, moving so quickly that it could only have come from another star. Avi Loeb, Harvard’s top astronomer, showed it was not an asteroid; it was moving too fast along a strange orbit, and left no trail of gas or debris in its wake. There was only one conceivable explanation: the object was a piece of advanced technology created by a distant alien civilization. In Extraterrestrial, Loeb takes readers inside the thrilling story of the first interstellar visitor to be spotted in our solar system. He outlines his controversial theory and its profound implications: for science, for religion, and for the future of our species and our planet. A mind-bending journey through the furthest reaches of science, space-time, and the human imagination, Extraterrestrial challenges readers to aim for the stars--and to think critically about what’s out there, no matter how strange it seems. The book was a New York Times bestseller, Wall Street Journal bestseller, and Publishers Weekly bestseller; named an Amazon Best Book of the Year; and longlisted for the 2022 PEN/E.O. Wilson Literacy Science Writing Award.

About the author: Avi Loeb is the Frank B. Baird, Jr., Professor of Science at Harvard University, chair of Harvard’s Department of Astronomy, founding director of Harvard’s Black Hole Initiative, and director of the Institute for Theory and Computation (ITC) within the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. He also chairs the Advisory Committee for the Breakthrough Starshot Initiative, and serves as the science theory director for all Initiatives of the Breakthrough Prize Foundation, as well as chair of the Board on Physics and Astronomy of the National Academies. Author of four books and over 700 scientific papers, Loeb is an elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, the American Physical Society, and the International Academy of Astronautics. In 2012, Time selected Loeb as one of the twenty-five most influential people in space. Learn more about Loeb here.

Registration is required; please sign up HERE. Note that Zoom details will come from the Tewksbury Public Library, the hosting institution. This program is sponsored by the Friends of the Morrill Memorial and Tewksbury Public Libraries.