The Interstellar Age: Inside the Forty-Year Voyager Mission

by Jim Bell

The story of the men and women who drove the Voyager spacecraft mission— told by a scientist who was there from the beginning.

The Voyager spacecraft are our farthest-flung emissaries—11.3 billion miles away from the crew who built and still operate them, decades since their launch.

Voyager 1 left the solar system in 2012; its sister craft, Voyager 2, will do so in 2015. The fantastic journey began in 1977, before the first episode of Cosmos aired. The mission was planned as a grand tour beyond the moon; beyond Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; and maybe even into interstellar space. The fact that it actually happened makes this humanity’s greatest space mission.

In The Interstellar Age, award-winning planetary scientist Jim Bell reveals what drove and continues to drive the members of this extraordinary team, including Ed Stone, Voyager’s chief scientist and the one-time head of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab; Charley Kohlhase, an orbital dynamics engineer who helped to design many of the critical slingshot maneuvers around planets that enabled the Voyagers to travel so far;  and the geologist whose Earth-bound experience would prove of little help in interpreting the strange new landscapes revealed in the Voyagers’ astoundingly clear images of moons and planets.

Speeding through space at a mind-bending eleven miles a second, Voyager 1 is now beyond our solar system's planets. It carries with it artifacts of human civilization. By the time Voyager passes its first star in about 40,000 years, the gold record on the spacecraft, containing various music and images including Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode,” will still be playable.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Space, History, Astronomy, Audiobook, Physics

324 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 24, 2015

About the author

James (Jim) F. Bell III (born July 23, 1965) is a Professor of Astronomy at Arizona State University, specializing in the study of planetary geology, geochemistry and mineralogy using data obtained from telescopes and from various spacecraft missions.
Dr. Bell's active research has involved the NASA Mars Pathfinder, Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR), Comet Nucleus Tour (CONTOUR), 2001 Mars Odyssey, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, and the Mars Science Laboratory missions. His book Postcards from Mars includes many images taken by the Mars rovers. Dr. Bell is currently an editor of the space science journal Icarus and president of The Planetary Society.
He has served as the lead scientist in charge of the Panoramic camera (Pancam) color imaging system on Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity.

Reviews

[William Lawrence · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book blew my mind. It's not five star for fancy prose. It's the ideas & concepts & basic facts about the mission that blow this one through the roof.

My favorite part: "And Pluto-- for God's sake, it's got an atmosphere and five moons of its own. If that's not a planet, I don't know what is... By my reckoning...our solar system has about thirty five known planets so far, and it's likely that dozens more will be discovered... Let's celebrate those numbers and diversity of planetary characteristics within our cosmic neighborhood rather than splitting them up into categories implying substandard status..." (p. 243)

[Jenni Paulsen Buchanan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm a bookish person, not a scientist. My excitement about space up until this point has included the enjoyment I get from finding the basic constellations, reading about Valentine Michael Smith, and watching Star Trek episodes. But this book inspired me. Jim Bell is a wonderful storyteller, an inside observer/participant of many aspects of the Voyager mission, and most importantly, a passionate planetary scientist and explorer. I took notes while reading The Interstellar Age. I looked up planets and moons to find out more information. I Googled "Heliopause." Honestly, I will never look at the sky the same way again.

I highly recommend this book for space aficionados and laypeople alike. It is a fascinating look into the history and politics of the Voyager missions, as well as the science and discovery. Jim Bell reads the audiobook himself, and it is fantastic! Go read this book, and be prepared to want more, more, more!

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Growing up, my older brother is very much into astronomy. I remember some nights when he has his telescope out and he'll try to describe the stars and the planets visible. It's safe to say that humanity have been fascinated about the stars and space through our recorded history. This book gives us a glimpse into the Voyager 1 & 2 projects. I've seen the images these 2 spacecrafts have produced. But have never really stopped and thought about what an amazing feat this has been. They gave us our first close up glimpse into the outer planets. They showed us new worlds much different than we can imagine. And even now, they're out there, farther than any man-made object has ever been and will be giving us more insights into interstellar space until their power sources give out. This book is a great read for any astronomy fan out there. I especially enjoyed listening to the author narrating the audiobook.

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

A single remark: my ebook-version had all the pictures in the addemdum. It would've topped it off having them included in the chapters.

[Andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

After reading Beautyland, I wanted to learn more about the Voyager mission. Bell does a great job telling the Voyager(s) story in mostly lay terms, with just enough science to remind the reader of how truly phenomenal this mission was/is.

I especially appreciated his interviews with key figures from the mission, including many women. Their input really humanized this nearly 50-year (now) journey.

This was a surprising read for me and I'm so glad I undertook it!

[Paul · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not really sure why this is called the "interstellar" age, given that everything in it happens within the solar system. Probably should have called it the intrastellar age. That said, that is the least of my issues with this book. This suffered from many of the same problems that How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming had - it was pointlessly and distractingly autobiographical, and way too masturbatory about the field of astronomy. I don't care if you met Carl Sagan, dude, or what conferences you got to go to, I just want to hear about the Voyager spacecraft.

What I did take away from this book was a general sense of how little hard data we actually had about even our own solar system until surprisingly recently. I'd be interested in reading a better book on this topic.

[Roo Phillips · Rating 3 out of 5]

If I could trace back to the beginning why I am where I am right now, I would probably tie everything back to the Voyager spacecraft. A science prep class my sophomore year of high school required a homework assignment on Voyager. I instantly fell in love with space, exploration, discovery, journey's, and possibilities. I would like to give the book 4 stars for personal reasons, but as the content and structure goes, it could've been better. It covers too little on the spacecraft themselves, and a lot of the presentation is confusingly presented, although it is not technical. Still, Bell tells a fascinating story in the history of humanity and understanding our place in the cosmos.

[David R. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bell's got astrophysical chops, but he's really a spectator (fanboy?) of the Voyager program that began in 1977 and witnessed new discoveries at four planets. The book has a noticeably breathless quality and there's an unusual amount of hero worship especially of the late Dr. Carl Sagan. The byproduct is a book that's interesting but not deep on material. I found myself wanting a good deal more. I think a book that solidly addresses Voyagers 1 & 2 would involve multiple contributors and skip the undo childlike wonder.

[Marlene · Rating 5 out of 5]

Originally published at Reading Reality

I had the same reaction to The Interstellar Age as I did when I went to the Kennedy Space Center a few years ago. I got choked up. Why? Because to this Star Trek fan, space travel is awesome and the future and I’m not going to get to go. Life is too short, and Congress doesn’t give NASA nearly enough funding for space tourism for the middle class to become “real” in my lifetime.

I will tie this back to Star Trek at the end, believe it or not.

But about the book...if you were ever hooked on space travel science fiction, or if you got up in the middle of the night to watch Neil Armstrong land on the moon, or if you’ve ever traveled to see a shuttle launch (or any kind of spacecraft launch) or if you can’t get enough Hubble Telescope pictures, this is a book for you.

While without rockets, it’s just science, this is a science story told through the people who worked on it or were affected by it. While, as one of the researchers says, we shouldn’t try to humanize or personalize the little rovers and probes that form the bulk of our current space program because, and I quote, “they don’t like it”, we can’t help but invest them with personalities and motivations of their own. They represent us. In a slightly robotic way, they are us, or at least the part of us that needs to go out and explore.

Possibly, as a recent strip from xkcd attests, they represent other parts of us as well.

On January 26th, 2274 Mars days into the mission, NASA declared Spirit a 'stationary research station', expected to stay operational for several more months until the dust buildup on its solar panels forces a final shutdown.

Back to Voyager and The Interstellar Age. I want to invoke Star Trek again. Because these are the voyages of the Interstellar Voyager Project, its ongoing mission: “to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no (Terran) has gone before.”

In the past 40 years, and continuing, the two Voyager space probes, and the probes that followed in their wake, have extended human knowledge of our solar system, and are now either completely outside of our Solar System (Voyager 1) or are getting there fast (Voyager 2). We humans have sent a piece of ourselves into the space between the stars, both in the hopes that we can continue to learn from its explorations, and that someday, perhaps, some other civilization in some other star-system will scoop it up and discover who we were.

The project is huge and was in many ways all encompassing for the people who worked on it. There are folks now part of the project who were not born when it began in the mid-1970s. But the story of their involvement, in this thing that turns out to have been the biggest and the best time of their lives, is very human and awe-inspiring in that humanity. It’s impossible not to wish you were there when those first photos of Jupiter’s moons appeared. Or with any of the other many firsts accomplished by these probes and the team that worked with them.

In relating the effect that his personal involvement with the Voyager mission has had on his life, the author shows us not just why this journey was important for him, but why it is important for us all.

Reality Rating A: I have a difficult time separating my feelings about the space program from my feelings about the book. Why? Because I want to have been there, and that still touches me deeply.

There are probably a generation (or two) of us who watched Star Trek as kids and saw the hope that humanity would reach the stars. I think we all wanted it to be in our lifetimes, but that is unlikely to happen.

This is a book about the joys and wonders of “big science”. It takes hundreds if not thousands of people devoting their lives and their careers to making project like the Interstellar Voyager mission a success. Or even a possibility. The Interstellar Age is the story of not just how it worked, but why.

It’s also a 40th birthday paean to the Voyager Program itself, and to the people who built them and made them fly.

As a reader, I occasionally got sidetracked with the names of all the different component parts, but all things considered, The Interstellar Age is a popular science story at its best.

One last Star Trek reference. The first Star Trek movie, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, was released in 1979, two years after the launches of Voyagers 1 and 2. In ST:TMP, at the heart of the alien vessel they find Voyager 6, returning to Earth in search of its creator, NASA.

Some day, centuries from now, one of the Voyagers, scarred and pitted by the interstellar winds, might come home - in the arms (or tentacles) of explorers from another star system.

We can dream.

[Ash · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing, just amazing. The wealth of information that this book carries and the amount of knowledge that I gained after reading this book is really incredible. Must must read for anyone who is even slightly interested in astronomy and our solar system. I learnt everything about the outer planets and their moons in our solar system thanks to this book. Voyager mission is probably the most difficult mission ever undertaken. I appreciate the efforts of all those who were part of this mission, since even a small error from any one person on the team could have resulted in the failure of this mission. I am surprised at the accuracy with which they calculated every single trajectory, flyby and sling shots around planets. Greatest mission indeed.
The audiobook was narrated by the author himself and it was great.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is for people who have a keen interest in space exploration. The Voyager missions are relatively unheralded as far as all space accomplishments go, but they may have yielded as much data as Hubble and other projects.

It is forty years since both missions were launched and both craft are the furthest objects that humankind has ever sent into space. They have moved out beyond our system and are traveling at a speed of 10 miles per second. Their electrical generators will run out of fuel in 2025 and thus the craft will go silent. They each have aboard a record of "earth sounds" in case someone hundreds or thousands of years from now encounters them.

A fascinating, well told story.

[Brian M · Rating 4 out of 5]

An engaging overview of one of humanity's finest achievements, the two Voyager space probes which explored Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune and changed our understanding of our solar system. Having been born into a post-Moon landing and post-Voyager world, it can sometimes be hard to understand how little we knew about our own solar system until very recently, and all of the amazing wonders we have discovered in a very short period of human history. This book does an amazing job placing you into the mission as it occurred, and lets you get a sense of what it was like to see images beamed from deep in our solar system back to Earth in real-time. The book also gives a sense of the very real constraints facing NASA and the Voyager team in planning and executing this insanely complicated mission.

Perhaps the strongest aspect of this book is Bell's delight and sense of wonder at all of the planetary bodies that Voyager imaged. So much of what we know was only learned due to the Voyagers being the first instrument to properly examine the diverse bodies in our solar system.
It is hard to fathom the striking diversity of our own solar system. The gigantic storms and absurd mass of Jupiter, the rings of Saturn which we happen to be existing at the same time to see and which will eventually disappear, the cloudy Ice Giants Uranus and Neptune, the many varied moons orbiting these planets that have ice volcanoes, lava volcanoes, worlds of ice with an ocean beneath, lakes of methane, diamond rain... there's so much out there it's impossible not to get excited about what there is still to discover.

Bell outlines his own biographic connections to the Voyager program, and gives a sense of what it was like at the time to experience Voyager's discoveries in real time as a person and as a scientist. The book tells us the context for the mission, it's reduced scope from the "Grand Tour," and the creation of the instruments and ultimate plan for the mission. It is insane to imagine just how much thought went into these machines blasted into space and that are still operating nearly 50 years later.

Bell gives us a brief biographic insight into the many people who made the Voyager missions possible. So many people dedicated their time and energy into these missions, but remain outside of the public eye. Carl Sagan makes an appearance, and his influence as a science communicater cannot be under-appreciated as he fought for the Voyager's iconic "Pale Blue Dot" image which is now so synonymous with space exploration. That photo very nearly did not happen!

One particularly interesting note was that of the Voyager moms who planned their children in-between major Voyager encounters so as not to interfere with their work. All of the engineering that went into slingshotting these amazing craft into deep space and eventually out of our solar system is all the more interesting upon learning that the computers availiable at the time are less powerful than your average car's keyfob. Ultimately a fascinating book about a fascinating achievement in human space exploration.

This book is about a decade old now and a lot has been learned since it's publication, (especially in regards to New Horizons, JWST, DART, the many missions planned to explore the moons of our solar system, etc) but the core of its narrative remains intact. Books like this are incredibly important to understand just how gargantuan of an achievement sending probes to meet our distant planetary neighbors was. Recommend this to any and all space fans.

[Edward · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bell’s book is an account of two rockets, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, that gave us high resolution photographic views of our solar system beyond Mars. They include views of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune with all of their rings and moons. When they were launched in 1977 there was a celestial arrangement of planets one that occurs only once every 175 years, and that allowed the spacecraft to fly by each of these planets, and even use gravitational force to accelerate their flight to the next planet. What they revealed are amazing differences in geological formations and gaseous atmospheres, accounted for by some known forces in planet creation, others unexplained. It’s a work that evokes curiosity and a deep wonder about our own planet and its fragile existence in the immensity of space

The title of the book refers to the fact that the two voyagers kept going beyond the limits of our solar system and I passed through the heliopause (the boundary between the solar and interstellar winds) into an incredibly remote distance from us, but in the universe, just a sliver of an entrance into even greater space. They will continue to communicate with us until their battery systems expire. Beyond that, their fate is unknown, but in the unlikely chance that they are discovered by some form of intelligence, one contains what a team put together as examples of significant artifacts from our earthly civilization.

I found the most interesting parts of Bell’s books to be, not just the photographs of these planets (poor quality black and white on my e-reader, but good color photographs can be found on You-tube), but Bell’s explanatory’ descriptions of the bizarre kinds of geologic features found on these planets, eruptions, swirls, craters, ridges, peaks, cavities, all existing at unimaginably cold temperatures and formed by some of form of gaseous activity. They resemble abstract paintings of endlessly diverse patterns.

Much of the rest of the book is taken up with details of the launching themselves, the preparations that had to be made, the scientists who were involved, the actions involved in justifying and getting government funding for these projects, the coordination that is crucial between the various sub teams, and finally there is considerable historical background about early astronomy.

Bell puts himself in the middle of all this activity as a participant and while it makes for a usable narrative structure the nuts and bolts details are not as interesting as what the Voyagers discovered. The payoff is worth it – the look at the end result, our new knowledge of these planets.

[Anna Lloyd · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just be flying with Voyager looking at volcanoes on Io and methane lakes on Titan and little jumbled up Miranda. I’m at peace 🥰

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was sadly really disappointed with this one. It still gets a pass rating, because I grew up indescribably obsessed with Voyager. I recently acquired an old copy of "Journey Beyond Selene", an infinitely superior history of Voyager and other robotic explorations that I had to have checked out of my local library's abysmally small science section at least 3 dozen times.

The entire thing read as a long reminiscence/brag. Credit where it's due: Bell does reiterate several times how goddamn lucky he got. He was born at the precisely correct time to be starting his undergrad at Caltach just as the Voyagers were due to fly by Jupiter, he attributes his admission to Caltech as "an administrative error", and the numerous other strokes of luck that continually placed him inside the mission rooms for no particular reason. It's somewhat refreshing, coming off the heels of a recent read of "Success and Luck", to read a candid admission of these things.

That said, I'm struggling to find the point of this book. It's not a history of anything but his own experience as a spectator, with his minor contributions at the tail-end of the Grand Tour, aside from some cursory asides that seemed to increase in frequency near the end. He doesn't particularly go into any of the history of the project beyond a brief recounting of the struggle to get the project approved.

He also doesn't go into anything very technical with the science, either. There is some brief mentioning of some of the larger discoveries at each planet, but the focus is decidedly on imaging and public outreach. Don't get me wrong, this was probably THE biggest accomplishment of the Voyager program (he mentions during the Sagan Solar System Selfie story (heh) that new NASA programs are now required to explain how this will feed public outreach and be relevant to our culture), but there is so much amazing science being brushed over.

I think that's an error in focus in the execution of the book. By jumping around a little haphazardly with a little bit of everything, it's hard to pin down the intended audience. It's decidedly non-technical, but Voyager is SUCH an enormous project that it is a detriment to the narrative to not choose a more narrow focus.

Similarly, the book starts off a bit vague and strange, and it took a while to find an anchor point to feel like we were on a linear narrative. It jumps around the timeline a bit, going between post-Voyager perspective to when the Grand Tour orbit was being developed and proposed to his own career track. I get it after the fact, but it did take me a while to engage with this one, which is a definite anomaly given my own history and obsession with Voyager.

My favorite part was the very end. I hadn't actually heard a recounting of how hard Sagan pushed for that final image that became one of THE most important of the entire project and the politics surrounding it (there were actually valid scientific reasons to not just immediately say yes). I have also not kept up to date with the science (and controversy) of monitoring when Voyager 1 passed through the Heliopause. This was one of the more technical sections, and coupled with it being the only real new information for me it's no surprise it interested me more than the rest.

Overall, it's not a bad book by any means, it's just a bit unfocused and more about one man's experience than an actual in-depth history or review of the science. The uninitiated and non-technical readers may enjoy this far more than I did, but I can also recommend a dozen other books covering Voyager with far more detail that I think would be a better starting point.

[Amanda Van Parys · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wasn't as comprehensive as I was looking for, but was still interesting nonetheless!

[Radu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some great insight into the Voyager missions and the outer Solar System, with a bit too much personal stuff from the author.

[Peter Tillman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty good, if unmemorable, account of, well, what it says. Here's the review that led me to read it:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/book-rev...
"Unmanned space exploration doesn’t prevent wars, cure dreadful diseases or yield any other salutary utilitarian accomplishment. On the evidence of Jim Bell ’s comprehensive and engrossing “The Interstellar Age: Inside the Forty-Year Voyager Mission,” however, it is easy to conclude that it is a more than worthwhile endeavor. "
I certainly agree, though Bell's account is on the pedestrian side -- to the extent that I picked it up again, here in 2019, with no real recollection of having read it 4 years before. 3.5 stars, rounded down for that.

[Ioannis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Είναι ένα από τα καλύτερα βιβλία που έχουν γραφεί για την εξερεύνηση του διαστήματος. Η ίδια η αποστολή των Voyager που πραγματεύεται είναι σπουδαία. Είναι καλογραμμένο βιβλίο, κρατάει ίσες τις ισορροπίες μεταξύ δύσκολων εννο��ών και εκλαΐκευσης. Το σπουδαιότερο όμως είναι ότι δίνει την ανθρώπινη ματιά της αποστολής. Οι πρωταγωνιστές δεν είναι τα διαστημόπλοια αλλά οι άνθρωποι πίσω από την αποστολή. Ενθουσιάζεται και ο αναγνώστης με τον τότε ενθουσιασμό τους.

Τρεις συμβουλές μετά την ανάγνωσή του. Πρώτο αγοράστε τη πιο καλή έκδοση και όχι την paperback (αν καταφέρετε να τη βρείτε). Δεύτερο δείτε το εξαιρετικό ντοκιμαντέρ: The Farthest. Και τέλος κοιτάχτε το βράδυ τα αστέρια πείτε ένα γεια στα Voyager και δείτε πόσο μικροί είμαστε.

[Menglong Youk · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5/5 stars

"Interstellar Age" is a book about the two Voager spacecrafts that went on a grand tour of our solar system to explore the worlds we only knew as dots in the sky. The book describes how the mission came to be and who were behind this masterpiece of engineering, technology and planetary science. It is quite fascinating to learn that forty years ago, humans were capable of sending probes to the far reach of the solar system and in 1990, Voager I took an image of what Carl Sagan called "Pale Blue Dot," the fragility of our home planet: Carl Sagan wrote a whole book about it, and I recommend readers to check out that book if they haven't read it yet.

[Matt Hurt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting and engaging account of the Voyager missions and humanity's first foray into Interstellar space.

Jim Bell also does a great job communicating the wonder and importance of humanity expanding it's knowledge of the universe and even our celestial neighbors. 

Informative and overall solid book that left me wanting to learn more. 

[Marcus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect (& intentional) timing to be reading this at exactly the 40-year mark since the Voyagers' launch. Both a highly informative and fascinating read detailing arguably the greatest space-based venture ever undertaken by mankind.

[Marie-Eve Chagnon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ya this was just plain awesome! If you want to learn more about the voyager missions then this is a book for you.

[Angelos · Rating 4 out of 5]

An amazing and, at times, mind blowing trip through our solar system and beyond along the Voyager spacecrafts. Arguably one of the most impressive human feats in history.

[Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

Listened to the audiobook, narrated by the author.

Jim Bell's love of space and fascination with the Voyager mission is infectious! I don't have anything of substance to say about this book, just that it's a great introduction to what these scientific masterpieces have accomplished in their 40 year "career". Highly recommended.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s amazing that we did this!

[Sebastian Page · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although the book “The Interstellar Age” was finally published by Jim Bell 8 years in the past during 2015, the story actually covers the astounding journey of the NASA Voyager satellite and the huge, powerful scientific “family” behind the operations that all direct and collaborate to keep pushing the mission forward. The highly vivid detailed background and extensive timeline described of the Voyager expeditions is one of the greatest representations on how an original attainable idea and goal that is simply displayed on paper can transform into such a mind boggling and expansive complexity of labor, scientists, managements, and production all collectively working to a historic moment. Through warfares, economic restrictions, sleepless nights, and strenuous workloads, both the group actually operating and creating this vision as well as the audience that is praying and hoping for their success were struck with glimmers of hopelessness and despair if they’ll ever witness and achieve the main goal of the Grand Tour, which is what they liked to call the Voyager mission as it traveled across the entire solar system: the threshold of interstellar space. Even with all of these struggles and problems that arose over this half-century long vision and dream, the tireless progress and churning put forth through the sacrifices and perseverance of this special workforce combined with the metaphorical and literal alignment of the stars and fortunes eventually led to the greatest leap mankind has made into the universe. Although each book, including “The Interstellar Age,” boast their individual flaws in the story, there is no doubt that Jim Bell’s literary masterpiece entertains and fulfills the dreams and aspirations of our childhood space fantasies and inquiries through his role in the collective effort.

Given the fact that this book is so amazingly composed and written about the relatively new realm of astronomical exploration and literature compared to other similar writings at the time, there is a plethora of entertaining and significant features that compile to create the compelling story altogether. Throughout most of the book, there wasn’t a moment where Jim doesn’t establish this sense of excitement and randomness of the upcoming events and discoveries about Voyager’s destiny, and it perfectly captures the fact that during this time period, most of the scientists and the general public themselves were not aware of the next mindblowing contrivances they were going to witness during the Grand Tour. After diving and reading the entire book, it’s quite obvious that Bell doesn’t hesitate and struggle at visualizing and emphasizing the tense, stressful moments in the control room during vital procedures and detailing how the scientists and project managers raced around tirelessly in hopes of preparing and operating the correct necessities, which Bell thoroughly explains on how this is such a burdening and nerve racking process as each key miniscule feature of the flight and traversal through the cosmos needed to be exact in precision and timing. Bell performed exceptionally well when establishing and demonstrating the family of the hardworking scientists and manager that was invisibly created during the generational Voyager project. When it comes to a massive idea and operation that requires long time periods of years or decades to accomplish, it’s understandable how tight, deep bonds and ties can form between the collaborators and people involved in the project, and the story further proves this fact as all of the project managers, engineers, scientists, and bystanders of the vision have come together as a non biological family in shared love, dedication, and commitment towards Voyager, which would lead to pure connections and gradually established traditions over time that perfectly demonstrate the importance and emotion in the aerospace industry. For an example of this aforementioned demonstration, one of the project scientists, Candy Hansen, has an ongoing belief in providing freshly-baked cookies to all of the workers who dedicate and sacrifice their lives and time into the project overtime, which shows how much everybody in the industry and the Voyager mission cares for each other and further establishes this unexplainable kind of magic and significance that is subtly exemplified through the entirety of the book. Lastly, Bell utilizes and expresses his ideas and experiences through the aeronautical jargon and vocabulary throughout the whole story, which may cause a few issues and problems comprehending the meanings of certain moments and plotlines in special circumstances, but it mostly demonstrates his credibility and reputation in the field and provides a greater understanding and knowledge of the mission and improves the entertainment and experience while reading. In general, the book comprises a compilation of suspenseful moments, exciting futures, and satisfying outcomes that combine to create a mysterious and gripping plot line as well as establishing this sense of inclusion and future application into later life experiences for any aspiring astronauts through the advanced vocabulary, but there tends to be a few flaws and imperfections in the story as well.

Although many people review and appraise “The Interstellar Age” as one of the greatest non-fiction titles revolving around and detailing the race into space by all of mankind, it is almost impossible to not point out and specify a few mistakes, problems, and missing key factors that are hindering the book from reaching the peak of perfection. Due to the sheer amount of people and workers collaborating and being included in the bulk of Voyager, an obvious lack of character development and description is evident past the baseline descriptions of names and professions, which, in effect, results in an absence of character personal connection and relatability through most of the book with only a few minor exceptions. Without the establishment of opinions and personalities of any characters in the story, there isn’t really much of a clear-cut main character, and the inability to describe and create this level of social relatability and connection with the public has the possibility to bore out and push away interests and enjoyability to a huge portion of individuals. However, the lack of personalization and specifications of characters tends to be the only huge issue within the masterpiece, and the remaining problems can be jotted up to the factors of technicality and pure longevity. In total, the Voyager project was enduring primary operations and advancement for a duration of 46 years and is still powering on and being studied upon to this day, so it’s inevitable that Bell does not have enough literary and actional value to span this increasingly extensive time period. Therefore, some elements and parts of the story are lackluster in entertainment, mystery, or excitement and mostly considered as filler, and, even though Bell attempts to filter out most of this unnecessary time and information out of the book, there is no doubt that these interventions and middleway time periods have the potential to take away the thrill or enjoyment of the story. Lastly, the cliffhanger ending that concludes the book imposes and leaves the possibility of many unanswered questions about the final resolution and accomplishments of the Voyager mission itself. Even though it is quite impossible to absolutely resolve and conclude the story altogether as the Voyager mission has not even officially concluded and been shut down in the time period of 2023, an unfinished ending and plot line has the tendency and potential to frustrate and disappoint many perspectives and psycho-analyzers who crave and require an absolute, solid ending to be satisfied, which is unfortunately impossible during present time. In the end, the three observable and objective problems with the story, even with the varying effects and influences on different readers, can not stack up and take away from the magic and history behind the overall story.

After all factors have been considered, those of excellence and those of imperfection, it is only correct to believe that “The Interstellar Age” should be given a rating of 4.6 stars across the entire literary family. Although it is true that there are a few observable mistakes and literary misdemeanors in the 300 page book, Bell amazingly compensates for the flaws by providing and entertaining the reader with such gripping moments of suspense, such spectacular discoveries, and such immortalizing memories of the journey that resonate deep within the caverns of hearts across the globe. However, the same respect and recognition that Bell should be honored with for composing this timeless masterpiece has to be received by the real-life characters and people in the story and developments of the projects who wrote the inspiration and outline for the book itself. Through many trials and tribulations, which included tireless months of working, many moments of despair and mystery, and stressful timelines of uncharted territory, the men and women behind the Voyager project banded together and created a family in order to establish and cement their vision and dream into reality that is going to be remembered as one of the greatest developments of space exploration in history. Even though those who grew up and constantly wondering upon the ideals and dreams throughout the cosmos have the ability to enjoy this book more sensibly and personally, there should be no neglect and overlooking by the differing general public of the book’s composition because the compelling vocabulary, mysterious plot switches, and magical moments that were perfectly organized and processed through the intellectual mind of Jim Bell can draw in and attract an audience all by itself, and if many take the promising risk to discover and dive into this once-in-a-lifetime literary work, there is no doubt they won’t regret it and will conclusively understand why many individuals consider “Voyager as the most amazing experience of (their) life” (220).

[kevin moore · Rating 5 out of 5]

excellent and informative writing that gets the balance right - people, technology and discovery.

[Joe Stierman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely loved it. Passionately written, and actually quite educational.

[Rod Van Meter · Rating 5 out of 5]

First rate pop science, by a scientist who has been there. Turns out the author was a year behind me at Caltech, but I don't think I knew him.