Customer Reviews

The Dream Machines: An Illustrated History of the Spaceship in Art, Science and Literature

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4 star:		(2)
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The first surprise for the new buyer of Ron Miller's "Dream Machine: An Illustrated History of the Spaceship in Art, Science and Literature" is that it was published in 1993, leaving the book strangely out-of-date despite being exactly what the spaceship romantic has desired all these years. My library is chock-full of books and magazines on the subject of spacecraft, and I admit with shame to having discarded older books which would now be collectors items because the spaceships depicted in them were "out of date". Something Miller's book emphasizes is that there is no such thing as an idea that is out of date. "Dream Machines" (beautiful title) treats Defoe (1705), Jules Verne (1865) and H.G.Wells (1901) who dreamed of space travel with the same dignity as Tsiolovsky, Goodard and von Braun, who made it a reality. This book's 714 pages are packed with the brilliant, the outlandish, the amusing, the thought-provoking and the real - and the almost real - spaceships which have graced humanity's longing to go "out there". The fan of early science-fiction has a rich field to explore, no less the student of hard-core spaceflight technology. Of special interest are details of the spacecraft which almost made it - the Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar, the European Space Agency Hermes spaceplane, the Russian Buran, and all the developmental designs which were considered, often discarded, with these never-to-fly spaceships. The impressive hard-cover book is well laid out, with bold-type dates and crisp drawings and a few color pages. There is some confusion about which drawing goes with which text due to minimal captions, but the generous white-space give the pages a friendly tone that allows the reader to go cover-to-cover (if one is so dedicated) or to leaf through looking for technological or impossible gems. The development and discards of the Apollo Moon project are well documented, and compared with the Soviet attempt to trump the United States in the Space Race to the Moon. The discussion of starship designs leans more to the "realistic" such as the British Interplanetary Society's "Daedalus", leaving Star Trek's "Enterprise" to get just a bit more than a mention. Many designers of spacecraft which never made the grade get their names into these pages. Author Miller has really delivered a work of love here. Strangely though, the reader's final emotion is one of sadness and loss. Here is all this brilliance, designing machines that could really take us off the Earth to however far we wish to go, yet few - very few - have become a reality, and usually by the power of short-sighted politics which beggar the vast vision of so many of those whose works are described in this book. If you dream of the Solar System and the stars, you need this one on your shelf.

In 360 B.C., Archytas of Tarentum made a model pigeon that flew by flowing steam out its tail. A humble beginning, perhaps, but it's the first entry in The Dream Machines, and it should give you some idea of just how comprehensive this book is. Every rocket I've ever seen or heard of is in here, fact or fiction, and for every one I knew about beforehand there are probably a hundred that I didn't know about until I found this book.

One of the best things about the book is that its contents are ordered chronologically. This lets you trace the evolution of spacecraft from pulp magazine covers to illustrations in popular and technical articles to serious design proposals to prototypes to full production. It gives you a taste of what it must have been like to watch all this happen in the middle of the 20th century, and it's fascinating to see all the designs that never made it off the drawing board. In particular, near the end of the book there are no less than 6 pages of drawings that trace the evolution of the Space Shuttle from a winged bullet launched from a jet-powered mothership to the familiar configuration that finally entered service in 1981. A similar sequence shows the development of the Apollo program spacecraft.

If all of that sounds dry instead of inspiring, you'll be pleased to know that all of those shiny silver rockets from the golden age of science fiction are in here, too. Some of them I hadn't seen since I was a 12-year-old watching old movies on Saturday afternoons, and there are many more that I had never seen at all. Radio dramas, television, movies, even prominent spacecraft from comic books and novels are covered.

The book is over 700 pages long and EVERY two-page spread has at least one illustration; most have three or four. The illustrations are in black & white and monochrome color, and there are several sections of full-color pages scattered through the book. Multiple orthogonal views are provided for many spacecraft, which will make this book a valuable reference for scale modelers. The reproduction quality of the illustrations is great, and the cover and binding are solid and of high quality. I know the book is durable because there is a well-thumbed copy at the local library that is still as sturdy as ever.

This is one of those books that you can dive into at random and not look up from for hours. If my house catches on fire, I'm going to grab this on the way out. It's spaceship heaven.

Exellent book for any rocket or sci-fi enthusiast. The illustrations and drawings bring home man's facination with the heavens. I have read numerous publications concerning rocketry, and by far this is the best book I have yet to see published to date. I was blown away by the sections, 'The Archaeology of the Spaceship', and 'The Experimenters'. All dealt with rocketry ante-WWII. There are also page after page of NASA concept vehicles that were never flown, including several pages of Apollo and Space Shuttle designs that did not make it to the lauch pad, but yet look like they are ready to just rocket from the page. This book would be a great source of information for those who scratch build model rockets. Color illustrations, 3 view diagrams, an appendix of U.S., Soviet, and international lauch vehicles; what more could one want? If I could only own one rocket book, this would be the book I would chose over all the rest! Buy this book, heck buy 2 and give one to a friend!

Miller's work is truly fantastic. Taking us on an incredible chronology of spaceflight and the fanciful ideas preceeding, we are able to see illustrations, diagrams, and meticulous narration woven together into an incredibly rich experience. If you have any interest whatsoever in space flight and flights of fancy, YOU MUST OWN THIS BOOK!

I can't believe how fantastic this book is! I got it for christmas and have a hard time putting it down. Considering the weight of this encyclopdiac work that's saying something. Pound for pound worth it's weight in gold or platinum! Only a few notable omissions that I would have liked to see (ie. "The Valley Forge" from Douglas Trumbull's "Silent Running" ) Probably the most amazing relvelation is that many current designs have thier genesis back in the late 40's ! Truly a must have for anyone who dreams or dreamed of interplanetary voyages!

Comment: Sensational chronological roundup of text, photos, and sketches of virtually every spacecraft and launch vehicle design every conceived but never built. A gold mine for space-struck baby boomers.

I agree with all of the other reviewers in that this book makes for all-emcompassing and fascinating reading. For the hobbyist, there are almost endless subjects to stoke the imagination. The time-line style of the book also works and gives the book a sense of forward momentum, of seeing how designs morphed as people's understanding of the nature of space and physics increased. Some of the designs are amazingly predictive of how actual spacecraft were made and used.

If the book has one flaw aside from some missing subjects (and I understand that this is subjective to me) it is that the illusrations and photos, while excellent and numerous, most are not keyed to a specific entry in the book. An illustration can occur on the same page, or pages before, or pages after its reference in made in the book. It means in many cases, flipping back and forth and searching to find the back-story to the illustration. A simple fig. 1-2 (example) or other identifier on the illustation with a matching reference in the text would have increased my enjoyment.

I still highly reccomend this boos to anyone with a interest in the subject. I continue to find intersting facts and previously unknown knowledge every time I open this book. The funkiness with the illutrations is the only reason I'm giving this book 4 stars.