The Space Barons: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and the Quest to Colonize the Cosmos

· Hachette Audio · Narrated by Will Collyer
5.0
8 reviews
Audiobook
10 hr 58 min
Unabridged
Eligible
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About this audiobook

The historic quest to rekindle the human exploration and colonization of space led by two rivals and their vast fortunes, egos, and visions of space as the next entrepreneurial frontier

The Space Barons is the story of a group of billionaire entrepreneurs who are pouring their fortunes into the epic resurrection of the American space program. Nearly a half-century after Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, these Space Barons-most notably Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, along with Richard Branson and Paul Allen-are using Silicon Valley-style innovation to dramatically lower the cost of space travel, and send humans even further than NASA has gone. These entrepreneurs have founded some of the biggest brands in the world-Amazon, Microsoft, Virgin, Tesla, PayPal-and upended industry after industry. Now they are pursuing the biggest disruption of all: space.

Based on years of reporting and exclusive interviews with all four billionaires, this authoritative account is a dramatic tale of risk and high adventure, the birth of a new Space Age, fueled by some of the world's richest men as they struggle to end governments' monopoly on the cosmos. The Space Barons is also a story of rivalry-hard-charging startups warring with established contractors, and the personal clashes of the leaders of this new space movement, particularly Musk and Bezos, as they aim for the moon and Mars and beyond.

Ratings and reviews

5.0
8 reviews
Alan Rominger
November 15, 2020
This is researched well enough that I got a few new bits of information beyond the news headlines on every topic. It also weaves some new things into the stories, like the ocean expedition to recover the original Apollo engines. It's hard to understate just how good the voice acting is for this book. The guy creates drama that I would not have gotten reading this on my own. This is all non-fiction, but the author and the voice acting really doubles-down on the tension. You still have to be a nerd to like the book, but it makes the topic accessible to the masses as much as anyone could possibly expect.
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Ankush Sharma
October 11, 2020
Nice book for space
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Zik tip
June 25, 2018
Many secret
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About the author

Christian Davenport is a staff writer at the Washington Post covering the space and defense industries for the financial desk. He joined the Post in 2000, and has written about the DC-area sniper shootings, the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, and the burial problems at Arlington National Cemetery. He is a recipient of the Peabody award for his work on veterans with Traumatic Brain Injury and has been on reporting teams that were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize three times.

Before joining the financial staff, Davenport was an editor on the Metro desk, overseeing coverage of local government and politics. He has also worked at Newsday, Philadelphia Inquirer, and Austin American-Statesman. As a frequent radio and television commentator, he has appeared on MSNBC, CNN, PBS NewsHour, and several NPR shows, including All Things Considered and Diane Rehm.

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Narrated by Will Collyer