How to Make a Spaceship

This article is about the 2016 book by Julian Guthrie about the Ansari X Prize. For the makeup of spaceships, see spacecraft.

How to Make a Spaceship: A Band of Renegades, an Epic Race, and the Birth of Private Spaceflight is a 2016 non-fiction book by journalist Julian Guthrie about the origins of the X Prize Foundation and Peter Diamandis, the first X Prize, the Ansari X Prize and Anousheh Ansari, the entrants into that suborbital spaceflight competition, and the winning team, Mojave Aerospace Ventures of Vulcan Inc., Paul G. Allen, Scaled Composites, Burt Rutan, and their platform of Tier One of SpaceShipOne and WhiteKnightOne.^[1][2][3]

How to Make a Spaceship

Author	Julian Guthrie
Audio read by	Rob Shapiro
Working title	Beyond
Country	United States
Language	English
Subject	Spaceflight
Genre	Non-fiction
Publisher	Penguin Books, Random House
Publication date	September 2016
Media type	Hardcover Softcover trade paperback CD audiobook Digital-file audiobook Digital-file e-book
Pages	448
ISBN	978-1101980491
OCLC	1011116852
Website	How to Make a Spaceship

Synopsis

The book is an overview of what led to the creation of the X Prize, and the running of that first X Prize. Profiles of the major players in the X Prize initiative are included in the book. It chronologically starts with the influences that weighed upon Peter Diamandis, and his progression into the space industry. It also covers the process to get funding, rejections, and the arrival of the Ansaris, becoming title sponsors. The book surveys several of the teams that entered into the competition to win the Ansari X Prize. The team that is focused on most is that which won the X Prize in 2004, the one headed by Paul Allen and Burt Rutan, of SpaceShipOne. The book ends with an epilogue about Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic acquiring the SpaceShipOne technology, and the spaceplane itself ending up in the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. The book includes a preface by Richard Branson and an afterword by Stephen Hawking.^{[4][3][5][6][7][8]}

Publication

The book was originally entitled Beyond: Peter Diamandis and the Adventure of Space, when it was sold preemptively to Penguin Books in 2014.^[9] How to Make a Spaceship was released in September 2016, in trade paperback, hardcover, audio book and e-book formats.^[1] The book appeared on several "Best Of" book lists and became a New York Times bestseller.^[10] Several parties expressed interest in obtaining the filming rights to the book.^[11]

Reception

Gregg Easterbrook's review in The Wall Street Journal said the book "offers a rousing anthem to the urge to explore".^[12]

Awards and honors

• Finalist – 2017 PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award (announced January 2017)^[13][14]
• Winner – 2016 Eugene M. Emme Astronautical Literature Award (announced September 2017)^[15][16]

See also

• Ansari X Prize
• Black Sky: The Race For Space, 2004 Discovery Channel television documentary about the Ansari X Prize
• Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, 2015 book by Ashlee Vance, biography of Elon Musk
• The Right Stuff, 1979 book by Tom Wolfe about the U.S. side of the Cold War Space Race
• The Spirit of St. Louis, 1953 book by Charles A. Lindbergh, autobiography and memoir of the famous solo non-stop trans-Atlantic flight for the Orteig Prize win

References

1. "How to Make a Spaceship". Penguin Books Random House. 2016.
2. Julian Guthrie (September 20, 2016). "How Charles Lindbergh Inspired Private Spaceflight". Time Magazine.
3. Robert Schaefer. "How to Make a Spaceship: A Band of Renegades, an Epic Race, and the Birth of Private Spaceflight". New York Journal of Books.
4. Foust, Jeff (October 3, 2016). "Review: How to Make a Spaceship". The Space Review. from the original on March 9, 2019.
5. Ben Kieffer; Katherine Perkins (September 6, 2017). "How to Make a Spaceship". IPR. Iowa Public Radio.
6. Zulfikar Abbany (December 8, 2016). "How to make a spaceship and get 'off planet' with renegades and college-dropouts". Deutsche Welle.
7. Vivek Wadhwa (September 19, 2016). "The renegade whose dream started the latest space race". Washington Post.
8. Tom Zoellner (October 6, 2016). "'How to Make a Spaceship,' by Julian Guthrie". SFGate.
9. Andy Lewis (October 7, 2014). "XPrize Space Race Story Gets Book Deal (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter.
10. Anita Busch (July 25, 2017). "Julian Guthrie Book 'Alpha Girls' Gets Scooped Up By Welle Entertainment After Bidding War". Deadline.com.
11. "Come on Hollywood, Give Us an X Prize Movie Already". Geek's Guide to the Galaxy. Episode 221. September 16, 2016.^{[dead link]}
12. Easterbrook, Gregg (September 16, 2016). "'How to Make a Spaceship' Takes on the Birth of the Second Space Age". The Wall Street Journal.
13. "2017 PEN/E. O. WILSON LITERARY SCIENCE WRITING AWARD". PEN America. 2017.
14. "2017 PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award Finalists Announced". E.O. Wilson Foundation. January 20, 2017.
15. Diane L. Thompson (September 8, 2017). "Julian Guthrie Announced as Recipient of American Astronautical Society Emme Award" (PDF). American Astronautical Society (AAS).
16. Jim Way (September 14, 2017). "Emme and Ordway Award Winners Announced". American Astronautical Society (AAS).

Further reading

• "Julian Guthrie". River to River. National Public Radio. September 6, 2017. Iowa Public Radio.
• "Julian Guthrie". Geeks' Guide to the Galaxy. PODtrac. September 16, 2016. Wired.com.
• Talks at Google, Julian Guthrie: "How to Make a Spaceship" on YouTube, Google (November 10, 2016)