SpaceX Starship

Elon Musk's Rocket to Mars

By: Jon Binder

Narrated by: Brennen Blotner

Elon Musk founded SpaceX with the mission of making humans a multiplanetary species. In the coming years, SpaceX will launch a crew of 24 people through space and onto Mars, in a new kind of rocket called Starship. Over 80 million miles away, Mars is both desolate, and at the same time, full of limitless potential. Mars holds limitless possibilities. Since the ideal alignment for Earth and Mars only happens once every two years, there is only a small window to get everything right.

The future of space exploration is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before. Although we’ve been exploring space since the 1950s, today, for the first time ever, we are going to be using supersized spacecraft to supercharge our journey into the solar system. As far as we know, Earth is the only planet in the known universe to contain any form of life. However, these 24 bold adventurers will become the first of what will eventually become a Mars colony of tens of thousands of people willing to leave everything behind to forge a new life on a new planet.

But before going to Mars, Starship will first complete several lunar missions to establish the Artemis Base Camp on the moon. Artemis will allow astronauts to stay for longer periods of time and complete important research projects to prepare for people living on Mars. The Starship vehicle that’s being developed by SpaceX will be able to launch more payload, have more power, and fly more often than any rocket ever produced. The last Saturn 5 rocket was launched by NASA in 1973, and since then, there has never been a more powerful rocket, until now. Starship can be refueled to be launched over and over again. It will become the workhorse used to carry thousands of people and millions of tons of cargo throughout the solar system.

These are not small advances in rocketry or spacecraft. These are truly transformational technologies that are giving us completely new capabilities and changing the paradigm for space exploration.

©2022 Jon Binder (P)2022 Jon Binder

It's gonna happen

I didn't put much stock in the ability of Humans living on or attaining "Mars life" in my lifetime...but now, I feel like I could even live to see Mars myself! (wild I know!)
The amount of research it required to write this book must have been staggering; but he brought the receipts! It would seem Elon Musk is much further along with the whole Mars plan than most anyone would probably suspect. The book gets down to basic logistics and all the way into hypotheticals like overcoming potential intergalactic monetary issues; and different day to day life on Mars scenarios.
Like a vacation for my mind, this book lifted me to the stars for an overall enjoyable read on what we could expect from Elon's SpaceX in the not so distant future. Now I'm a believer.

Dry but informative

There wasn't much story. This book is essentially listening to a dry recitation of facts over a timeline. The narrator is a bit robotic, too. If you know nothing about SpaceX or Starship, it's informative.

Timely Topic

This was an interesting and timely topic. This book takes the listener from the very beginnings of spacex to what life would look like in the future on Mars. Thought provoking and fair even criticisms of the program are reviewed. Really fantastic!

How unremarkable

It didn’t cover anything I couldn’t discover on my own with a quick search of the latest SpaceX news. Not worth the credit.

To Infinity and Beyond!

An Enjoyable read -- the book takes you on an Informative, concise and detailed journey that explores the humble and unlikely beginnings of SpaceX, quickly rocketing into a new chapter for mankind.
Sheds light on the monumental hurdles facing interplanetary space travel and the Hurculean effort SpaceX undertook to make this possible. I recommend this book if any of these topics interest you.

Enjoyed this!!

Well-researched and written in a way that was very digestible. I learned a lot.

This is... fine

This boom reads like a history textbook or an extended Wikipedia article written by a SpaceX marketing intern. There's some interesting facts here and there but there very little context or relatable insight exploring the "how" and "why" behind the history.

This near-exclusive recitation of facts becomes even more frustrating as a point-in-time snapshot; as I write this review in late 2024, only two years after the book's release, several topics have already been rendered obsolete.

Poorly read. Even poorly written

Just a collection facts, no story telling no insights. Robotic reading voice. Total waste of money