Rocket Dreams: Musk, Bezos, and the Inside Story of the New, Trillion-Dollar Space Race

Washington Post staff writer Davenport (The Space Barons) offers a captivating, fast-paced account of the ambitions and rivalries of the billionaires and superpowers driving modern space exploration. Opening with the successful 2024 launch and landing of SpaceX’s Starship, the “most powerful rocket ever assembled,” Davenport follows the manic progress toward deep space exploration, largely led by Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin as they battle over billion-dollar contracts from NASA, as well as by an increasingly competitive China. Well sourced with a surprising level of access to major players like Musk, the book’s fly-on-the-wall perspective contrasts the American organizations’ divergent managerial styles: SpaceX’s no-sleep, breakneck speed; Blue Origin’s “homey, comfortable vibe”; and NASA’s conservative caution. These distinctions provide insight into the tensions behind historic achievements, such as experienced astronauts’ skepticism about flying SpaceX’s Dragon capsule without a stick (“like flying an iPhone”); they also help explain ongoing failures, like Blue Origin’s frequent trailing behind SpaceX’s innovation. Among the narrative’s many amusing behind-the-scenes anecdotes are a Blue Origin senior vice president who consoles disappointed employees after the loss of a lunar lander contract by playing Chumbawamba’s “Tubthumping,” and Musk’s relentless “string of insults” aimed at Bezos. It makes for a revealing glimpse into the egomaniacal antics, stagnant bureaucracy, and awe-inspiring advancement that define the new space age. (Sept.)