Since this past September, Saturn’s been the best planet to enjoy through even a small telescope, even though its ring system still appears nearly on edge from our vantage on Earth currently. There’s a new sheriff in the night sky though, Saturn’s big brother Jupiter, the king of the planets, on the rise in the eastern heavens along with Orion and the rest of the great winter constellations. Jupiter is by far the largest planet in our solar system, 88,000 miles in diameter. Jupiter’s so enormous that if it were hollow about 1,000 Earths would fit inside it.

Without a doubt, Jupiter’s the brightest “star” in the night sky right now. Jupiter’s especially bright now because Earth and Jupiter are the closest they’ll get to each other this year, about 395 million miles. That’s because Earth and Jupiter are in an alignment astronomers call opposition. Earth is nearly in a direct line between the sun and Jupiter. something astronomers call opposition. This is a great time for Jupiter gazing, not only because the great planet is close to us but also because it’s available all night long. Just like a full moon, Jupiter rises at sunset and sets at sunrise. And there’s more great news! Jupiter will dominate the night sky well into this coming spring.

Jupiter, like Saturn, is a wonderful telescope target, even if you have a small scope. It’s basically a tremendously large ball of mostly hydrogen and helium gas, over 300 times more massive than Earth. In fact, Jupiter is twice as massive as all of the other planets combined. Like the rest of the gas giants in the outer solar system, it doesn’t have a solid surface but is thought to have a rocky core about 10 to 15 times the mass of the Earth. Because of its colossal mass, Jupiter has a very strong gravitational field, so strong that even if the planet had a surface to stand on, you wouldn’t be standing there long. The gravity of Jupiter would break you down to a pile of flesh and broken bones very quickly.

Jupiter’s gravity also causes the giant planet to produce energy. Jupiter’s interior gases are constantly being gravitationally compressed, which produces heat that oozes out of the planet. In fact, Jupiter produces over one and a half times the energy that it receives from the sun, mostly as infrared radiation. That heat drives the atmospheric winds hundreds of miles an hour.

Jupiter’s atmosphere is made up of complex bands of wind-driven clouds mainly made up of methane, ammonia, and other gases. The different colors are the result of gases being at different temperatures and densities, as well as ultraviolet radiation from the sun. There are also several storms on Jupiter like the “Great Red Spot”, a storm that’s been raging for over 300 years! It’s been shrinking very gradually over the years but is still larger than the diameter of our Earth.

Through even a small telescope, you can see at least some of these cloud bands, especially two darker ones on either side of Jupiter’s equator. If your scope is larger, you might even see the famous Red Spot but we only see it about half the time since Jupiter rotates on its axis just like the Earth but much faster, taking only just under ten hours to make one rotation. So, about every five hours, the Great Red Spot is facing our way. The absolute best time to spot it though is when it’s on the meridian, near the middle of Jupiter’s giant disk. Even then, it can be really tricky because, honestly, it’s not all that red. Most of the time it’s somewhere between light pink and salmon colored.  Apps like Sky Guide can help you keep up with the Red Spot’s position and when it’s due to be on the meridian.

Jupiter also has dozens and dozens of orbiting moons, four of which can easily be seen using just about any telescope or even a cheap pair of binoculars. There are four larger moons, called the “Galilean” moons, in honor of their discoverer way back in the early 1600s. These look like little “stars” that circle the planet in periods of two to seventeen days. These moons are another story all by themselves, and I’ll have that next week in Skywatch.

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and retired broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis/St. Paul. He is the author of “Stars: a Month by Month Tour of the Constellations,” published by Adventure Publications and available at bookstores and adventurepublications.net. Mike is available for private star parties. You can contact him at mikewlynch@comcast.net.

Mike Lynch astronomy-stargazing programs

Friday, Jan. 23, 6:30-8 p.m., Lake Elmo Park Reserve, Lake Elmo. For information and reservations, call 651-430-8370 or visit www.co.washington.mn.us/index.aspx?NID=532

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Vong Bidania’s earliest childhood memory, faded now like an old color photo, is of an orange bus pulling out of a refugee camp in Thailand.

“I was so young, I’m not sure if this is real or something I made up in my head. But I knew it was sad, everybody crying, holding their hands out the bus windows. It’s daytime in my memory, but I know we left at night,” Bidania said in a conversation from her home in a Twin Cities suburb.

(Courtesy of the author)

That bus and those goodbyes are in Bidania’s new book “A Year Without Home” (Nancy Paulsen Books, $18.99), her first middle-grade novel and her first in verse. It has already earned starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Booklist and School Library Journal for beautiful prose and a gripping story.

The narrator is 11-year-old Gao Sheng, the author’s older sister, and Bidania uses the real names of her other siblings in the book: brother Yia and sisters May la, Good Xai and Round Moon (the baby who is Bidania). They all grew up in St. Paul.

We meet the Thao kids first in the Hmong village of Pa Kao in the highlands of Laos, where they live in a big, multi-generational house. They and their cousins roll down their hill for fun, eat fruit from the peach trees and play with Ao Ka, their precious dog. It’s a happy life, even though they sometimes have to flee into the jungle to be safe from bombing during the Vietnam war.

Gao Sheng is sometimes annoyed because as the oldest daughter she is responsible for cutting vegetables, looking after her siblings and young cousins and always acting like a proper Hmong girl — quiet and obedient and never asking questions she longs to ask.

“My name, Gao Sheng,/is a classic name,/a name meant for girls/who are elegant, graceful, charming-/all embarrassing things I am not!”

Gao Sheng loves her brother, but she also resents the freedom he has as the only son who will someday be head of the family. Later in the story, in a heartbreaking scene, she realizes how much her little brother means to her.

As the novel begins in May, 1975, everyone in the the village knows the Communists are coming and they will hunt down men like the Thao children’s father, who was a captain in the Noble Lao Army. They leave in a hurry, missing the plane that was evacuating those who helped the American military. Gao Sheng’s dad and his brothers travel through the jungle, while her mother, aunts and 11 children head for the river in taxis. Reunited with the men, the family crosses the Mekong in canoes to refugee camps in Thailand on a dark and rainy night.

“The canoe wobbles/shakes from side to side./I grab my seat/to keep steady,/try to listen for my relatives/boarding the other canoes/around us,/but all I hear/is the sound/of/my own/frightened breath.”

At the two camps where they live for months, the family sometimes sleeps on hard tabletops because there aren’t enough beds for the ever-growing refugee population. They live with strangers, whole families crowded into small rooms as they wait for permission to immigrate to other countries. In one camp Gao Sheng breaks a cultural norm by helping her father and uncles with a big project, amazing her relatives with her physical and mental strength.

When the family finally gets permission to leave, their first home in the U.S. is the town of Sparta, Wis., where they are sponsored by a church.

Hmong refugees began to arrive in Minnesota 51 years ago, so there are a growing number of books about their experiences. Some authors don’t spend much time discussing life in the camps and that’s what is unusual about Bidania’s novel; it’s all about the family’s life before their escape and their time in the hot, dusty camps where the refugees made their lives as normal as possible while living in a facility with guards. The men play soccer and women and girls shop at an open air market outside the gates on Sunday mornings before the guards arrive. Gao Sheng enjoys going to school. After residents are given food allotments, the Thao family is able to eat their mom’s good cooking instead of the thin soup served in the cafeteria.

“I hope young readers will see history with a more fully dimensional picture, learning what it’s like to be ripped away from everything you’ve known,” Bidania says of her book, in which Gao Sheng can take only a packet of peach tree seeds when her family flees, hoping to grow her favorite fruit in a new home she knows nothing about.

Minnesotan V.T. Bidania launches her first middle-school novel, “A Year Without Home,” Jan 24, 2026 at Red Balloon Bookshop in St. Paul. (Courtesy of the author)

Bidania has been a writer since she was 5 and wrote a story about a frog, with crayon illustrations. She loved books so much she spent most of her free time reading at the family’s home on Holly Avenue. After earning a journalism degree from St. Catherine University and an MFA in creative writing from the New School in New York, Bidania worked in children’s publishing until she and her husband, Win, moved back to Minnesota to be closer to family. They have two sons in college.

If Bidania’s name sounds familiar to readers of children’s lit, it’s because she is the author of the Astrid and Apollo books featuring twins who live in St. Paul, the first children’s books series with Hmong-American characters.

Bidania was drawn to middle-grade books because she finds the writing “gorgeous,” and although she has no formal poetry training the format intrigued her.

“I wanted to write a book that packed as much punch as the ones I read like ‘Unsettled’ (by poet Reem Faruqi), with lots of white space,” she says.

In “A Year Without Home” the dancing type takes its cue from the mood of the poem it illustrates. Sometimes it’s one word going straight down or slanting sentences forming a paragraph. There might be only a few lines on a page. In our visual world this is a fun way to keep readers 10 and older interested.

An undated black and white courtesy photo of the Thao siblings in Sparta, Wis., their first home in America. Back row, from left: May la, Yia, Gao Sheng. Front from left: Round Moon and Good Xai. (Courtesy of the Thao Family)

Bidania spent a lot of time researching her book, which takes place in the confusing and frightening time between the end of the Vietnam War and the beginning of Communist takeover. To be historically accurate, she interviewed relatives and others who lived through it and read whatever government documents she could find about a war that was conducted so much in secret. She also traveled to Laos in 2024 to look for the house on the hill depicted in the book, but she didn’t find it. It was the rainy season, roads were impassable, and anyway the house had been swallowed by jungle.

Although the book doesn’t name the Thao siblings’ parents, they are real-life heroes. Their late father, Nao Vu Thao, always kept his family safe during their journey to America. Working with Catholic Charities, he helped hundreds of immigrants from many countries resettle in Minnesota and was widely respected in the Hmong community and in St. Paul. HIs wife, Sia Thao, organized the family’s escape from their village, keeping her sisters-in-law and the children together and courageously handling being questioned by police who were looking for her husband.

“A Year Without Home” ends in May 1976, with the family living in Sparta, Wis., where they were sponsored by a church. Bidania deliberately concluded the story there, without taking her characters to St. Paul where they eventually settled.

“We faced racism on a regular basis in St. Paul but I didn’t want to write trauma porn, rehashing that in the book,” she explains. “People like to hear about our suffering. It’s like ‘Oh, you poor people.’ Hmong people did face many challenges during and after the war but I wanted to write about a side of us some people don’t know — our homes, families, communities — a human story. I wanted to educate young readers about the history of the Hmong that is not taught in schools. I want them to know that their peers are experiencing wars right now all over the world. They should be aware of this and have some empathy for what today’s refugees are going through.”

Bidania will launch her book at 4 p.m. Saturday at Red Balloon Bookshop, 891 Grand Ave., St. Paul, in conversation with Payal Doshi, author of the middle-grade fantasy “Rea and the Blood of the Nectar,” and a four-book series of chapter books, “Magic Gems,” coming out later this year. Free, but reservations are encouraged. For more information, visit redballoonbookshop.com.

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LORETTA ELLSWORTH: Minnesota author discusses her novel “The Jilted Countess.” 6 p.m. Thursday, Barnes & Noble, 3230 Galleria, Edina.

JACK EL-HAI: Minnesotan discusses his book “The Nazi and the Psychiatrist,” basis for the film “Nuremberg,” starring Russell Crowe and Rami Malek. 2 p.m. Jan. 25, University of St. Thomas, O’Shaughnessy Education Center, 2115 Summit Ave., St. Paul. Presented by Jewish Community Relations Council, Jewish Historical Society of the Upper Midwest, University of St. Thomas and Jay Phillips Center for Interreligious Studies. Free, registration required. Go to Jewish Community Relations Council Minnesota & Dakotas.

DAVID HAKENSEN: Introduces “Her Place in the Woods: The Life of Helen Hoover.” 5 p.m. Wednesday, Lowell Inn, Stillwater, presented by Valley Bookseller.

HOLBROOK/LITTLE: Carolyn Holbrook, teacher, author and founder of More Than a Single Story, and Arletta Little, executive and artistic director at the Loft Literary Center, talk about their their lives and careers and the paths that got them where they are now, part of Holbrook’s Embracing Our Roots program that puts Black artists with next-generation arts leaders. Free.1 p.m. Saturday, University of Minnesota Elmer L. Andersen Library, 222 21st Ave., Mpls.

MINNESOTA MYSTERY NIGHT: Monthly series begins its new season with guest reader and Edgar award-winner David Housewright in conversation with movie producer and director Patrick Coyle. Both men live in St. Paul. Housewright has written 31 novels, most in either the Holland Taylor or Rushmore McKenzie series with the next one, “Fear the Reaper,” to be published in June. He is winner of three Minnesota Book Awards and past president of the Private Eye Writers of America. Coyle has written and directed four nationally released feature films. His newest play, “Big Blue River,” premiered in 2023 at North Garden Theatre in St. Paul and ran for six sold-out weeks. He is an adjunct professor of film at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and lead singer of the band One Hit Wonders. 7 p.m. Monday, Lucky’s 13 Pub, 1352 Sibley Memorial Hwy., Mendota. Free. Registration required at mnmysterynight.com. $13 reservation charge.

READINGS BY WRITERS: Tim Nolan hosts poets Jane Dickerson, Douglas Padilla, Pete Heiden and William Reichard. 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, University Club, 420 Summit Ave., St. Paul.

DEBRA J. STONE: Discusses “The House on Rondo” in Friends of the St. Paul Public Library’s Fireside Readings series. 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, Rondo Community Library at Hallie Q. Brown Community Center, 270 N. Kent St., St. Paul.

What else is going on

Thomas Maltman (Courtesy of the author)

Thomas Maltman, award-winning Minnesota mystery writer whose books include “Ashes to Ashes” and “Little Wolves,” will open the spring Club Book series March 18 at Wescott Library in Eagan followed by Lee Hawkins on March 28, Nathan Harris on April 1, Carley Fortune pn April 9, Tessa Bailey on April 14, Sara Hashem on April 16, Cleyvis Natera on April 28 and Daniel H. Wilson on May 4. The free series, which brings important authors to metro-area libraries, is presented by Metropolitan Library Service Agency (MELSA). Venues will be announced closer to the authors’ reading dates.

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As New Year’s Eve approached, I found myself mulling over something that in all my previous adult years would have been unthinkable: What if I didn’t drink? Sure, I had a lovely bottle of champagne chilling in the fridge. But I’d already planned on having Dry(ish) January. Wouldn’t it be great to wake up in 2026 fully rested and with a clear head?

My internal dialogue mirrors the growing number of Americans leaning into moderation. After everyone went a little overboard during the pandemic, more people in the U.S. are reassessing their drinking habits — or, especially among younger generations, eschewing alcohol altogether.

That reassessment has manifested in a sustained decline in alcohol consumption, as was underscored in a recent Gallup poll showing that just 54% of adults said they consume alcohol — the lowest level in nearly 90 years.

So how much of the credit does Dry January — the annual monthlong break from drinking that started in the UK in 2013 and has since gained popularity in the U.S. — deserve for a more sober country?

At least a little. Substance abuse experts caution against attributing too much to any single trend, particularly when there’s limited data on the long-term effects. But one thing seems clear: Dry January (along with Sober October) has helped accelerate a shift in Americans’ attitudes about what it means to abstain. The annual event has given people “cultural permission to pause,” says Marisa M. Silveri, director of the Neurodevelopmental Laboratory on Addictions and Mental Health at McLean Hospital, in Massachusetts.

That’s a big deal.

“Both the sober curious movement and Dry January have really helped normalize not only pausing but also being able to evaluate your own drinking without labeling, without stigma — without feeling bad about it,” Silveri says. That fits into a broader harm reduction approach that allows people to get the health benefits of cutting back without necessarily cutting out altogether, she adds.

The event gives people the space to evaluate their habits and take a hard look not just at how much and how often we drink, but at how it affects our sleep, mood, and even weight — not to mention how we manage stress. My own experience with a more sober month has resulted in a slow shift away from alcohol. Three years into my “damp” January approach, I still drink, but far less often and more thoughtfully.

This societal experiment with moderation or sobriety seems fueled by a growing recognition that alcohol isn’t particularly good for us. That may sound obvious — it’s no secret that heavy drinking wreaks havoc on the liver. But last year’s health advisory from then-Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, which highlighted the link between moderate drinking and cancer, was a wake-up call for many. After the report’s release, my phone lit up with messages from friends who hadn’t been aware of the increased risk of breast cancer associated with heavier drinking.

And as evidence continues to mount linking alcohol to other long-term harms, such as dementia, the public health narrative is shifting — from one that suggests moderation is safe or even healthy to one that suggests no amount of drinking is safe.

Gen Z appears to be particularly internalizing that message, leading to a “generational redefinition of what is normal drinking, or what is acceptable drinking,” Silveri says. The Gallup poll found that some 66% of young adults view moderate drinking as bad for their health — more than double the number that felt that way a decade ago. Perhaps it’s no surprise, then, that they are drinking less: In that same poll, just half of adults under 35 said they drank, down from 59% in 2023.

Silveri also suspects that some consumer trends may be helping more people cut back. The widespread use of wearables, for example, can offer hard evidence of just how much that second (or third) glass of wine disrupts sleep. Meanwhile, the booming market for alcohol-free beverages is making it easier for Gen Z’s sober party girls to go alcohol-free and Millennials to zebra stripe (a “mindful drinking” trend where you alternate alcoholic drinks with non-alcoholic ones) their way through a night out.

So how much further will this trend go? Henry Kranzler, director of the Center for Studies of Addiction at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine, points to the decades-long decline in cigarette smoking in the U.S. as a model. After a landmark 1964 report from the U.S. surgeon general linking cigarettes to lung cancer, smoking rates steadily fell from 42% to below 12%.

While Kranzler can’t predict whether alcohol will follow the same trajectory, Gen Z’s disinterest in drinking is a good sign the downward trend will continue. Problematic drinking has historically peaked in young adulthood, so the hope is that fewer young adults engaging in heavy drinking today will translate into a lower lifetime risk for heavy drinking for that generation.

Ultimately, I did pop open that special bottle of champagne. My best health bet might be to abstain altogether, but I also find joy in celebrating with my loved ones. Still, the next day, I returned to my “damp” January project — and have felt all the better for it.

Lisa Jarvis is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering biotech, health care and the pharmaceutical industry. Previously, she was executive editor of Chemical & Engineering News.

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