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Roving Mars: Spirit, Opportunity, and the Exploration of the Red Planet Paperback – May 10, 2006

by Steve Squyres (Author)
4.5 out of 5 stars 52 customer reviews
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Product Details

  • Paperback: 432 pages
  • Publisher: Hyperion; Reprint edition (May 10, 2006)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1401308511
  • ISBN-13: 978-1401308513
  • Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 8 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (52 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #224,852 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Top Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 starsA scientist's journal
By Kevin W. Parker on September 4, 2005
Format: Hardcover
(Let me start off by saying that I reserve 5 stars for books that are truly outstanding, not, like some Amazon reviewers, for any book that is just pretty good. For me, 4 stars is a VERY good rating.)

I have felt some lingering jealousy watching the videos of the rover control center at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. I support spacecraft for a living, but somehow what I've been doing hasn't seemed quite as exciting or sexy as working with rovers on Mars (and particularly not now, with Goddard's heyday apparently in the past.)

Squyres' book both dulls and enhances the glamor. He spends some time talking about the long, hard slog he took to become Principal Investigator for a Mars mission, starting in 1989 with an effort to develop a camera to fly on a NASA Mars mission. He proposed sticking it on a mission called MESUR Pathfinder in the early 90's and was turned down. He tried again to develop a science package to go to Mars in 1998, and that was turned down. NASA expressed interest again a few years later, he resubmitted, and it was turned down again. He put a lot of work into a complex set of missions set to start going to Mars in 2001, a program that was killed when Mars Climate Orbiter and Mars Polar Lander failed in quick succession.

By 2000, though, NASA was looking for a glamorous mission to redeem its Mars reputation, and Squyres' rover seemed to fit the bill. Not only was his mission chosen, but he was asked for two of them.

The schedule ended up being brutal, having to develop a complex mission inside of three years with the unforgiving, inflexible 2003 Mars launch window looming up ahead.Read more ›
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5.0 out of 5 starsa great story, well told.
By pkeahi on August 9, 2005
Format: Hardcover
For fans of Spirit and Opportunity and the team that made them what they are, some of this book will be familiar - like Dr. Squyres' quotes about the launches, landings and images - but fans will still want to have it for all the other goodies.

Dr. Squyres answers questions we didn't see in media interviews - like:
-who is that EDL guy who looks like Elvis' younger brother?
-what does Dr. Steve hope for the Rovers centuries from now?
-how was beer involved in the MER project?
-how do smart, strong, stubborn people come together to do something so challenging?

Technical details abound - including stories about getting the airbags right, making it to the launchpad, and the INIT_CRIPPLED command that saved the day. The technical details remind me a bit of Tracey Kidder's Soul of the New Machine. So, I think it would be a fun read for fans of Kidder's book.

There are some press release images in the two sets of mostly color pictures, but there are also some fun surprises.

There is also an Appendix listing over 4,000 names - the best effort to name the entire MER team - wow.
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5.0 out of 5 starsA great tale of exploration
By Ralph Lorenz on August 21, 2005
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
Squyres is smart, dynamic and articulate, and gives the inside

story not only of the construction and operation of the rovers,

but also all the politics that led to the project in the first

place. It's a pretty gripping read, and makes the personalities

involved come to life, as well as the rovers themselves. Tech

fans will not be disappointed with the details of software,

grounding, parachute design and all of the nitty-gritty

problems that had to be fixed. I loved it.
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2.0 out of 5 starsToo reductionist, not enough context
By Michael Mudd on August 13, 2009
Format: Paperback
There's a book-length irony in Roving Mars. Early on, author Steve Squyres talks about the difference between scientists and engineers. Scientists want perfection, engineers whatever's "good enough." Scientists are inspiration, engineers perspiration. Scientists are idealistic, engineers are pragmatic. Steve Squyres is a scientist. In fact he's the chief scientist on the project. Yet, if ever there was an engineer's book, this is it. Roving Mars is far more about how Spirit and Opportunity were assembled than why. More about what the rovers found than what the discoveries mean. And a thousand times more about the minutest details of the two patches of Mars the rovers explored than the planetary big picture the terrain is part of. In other words, the book is relentlessly reductionist. Reading it feels like looking down a microscope for hundreds of pages. There's precious little context. It's virtually all trees, branches, leaves and cells, and almost no forest.

Is this a fair complaint? That depends on who there book was "written for." Unquestionably it was written for a lay audience, not the scientific community. But which lay audience?. If Squyres set out to write a book for people who are thrilled by the tiniest technical details about how many watts this resistor can bear versus that resistor, or how to wheedle your way through the labyrinth of NASA project approval, then he has succeeded brilliantly. But if he intended his book for people interested in the planet Mars, in thoughtful musings about why man explores and the significance of what he finds, or even just in some broader geological hypotheses around what the rovers are looking at, then he has fallen way short.Read more ›
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

perfect!

Published 24 days ago by Robin M. Gabbert
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Great Book!!

Published 8 months ago by Anne Herzog
5.0 out of 5 starsESSENTIAL MARS READ

A MUST READ ADJUNCT TO "THE MARTIAN" GREAT READ

Published 11 months ago by barnacle bill
5.0 out of 5 starsEndless Plain of Basalt

This is a important work about the two rovers Spirit and Opportunity. Steve Squyres gives an honest assessment of what it took to get to Mars and even admits Gusev may have been... Read more

Published 20 months ago by RedHeadEd
5.0 out of 5 starsGreat Book

This is a great book because it is easy to read and interesting for a technical topic. Recommended.

Published 21 months ago by jjsharkbait
5.0 out of 5 starsFantastic

Great book on the science and engineering of what it takes to get something to Mars. Fantastic!

Published 22 months ago by schism76
5.0 out of 5 starsMasterful Storytelling

By virtue of his role as PI for this mission, it's evident that Steve Squyres must be an accomplished scientist who is also highly skilled in engineering, program management,... Read more

Published 23 months ago by J. D. Maloy
5.0 out of 5 starsgreat

It's a great book

Published 23 months ago by Angel
5.0 out of 5 starsWho thought that the description of scientific research over a ...

Who thought that the description of scientific research over a period of years would be so exciting. I had trouble putting it down. Read more

Published on December 2, 2014 by Annette Warden
5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Squyres makes the history of the Mars rover read like an exciting novel!

Having only seen the national news coverage, the rovers seemed like an easy, done deal. Read more

Published on November 26, 2014 by Fran Tabor

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