Earth is not well. The promise of starting life anew somewhere far, far away—no climate change, no war, no Twitter—beckons, and settling the stars finally seems within our grasp. Or is it? In their new book A City on Mars: Can We Settle Space, Should We Settle Space, and Have We Really Thought This Through? Kelly and Zach Weinersmith set out to write the essential guide to a glorious future of space settlements, but after years of research, they aren’t so sure it’s a good idea. In the process, the Weinersmiths answer every question about space you’ve ever wondered about, and many you’ve never considered: Can you make babies in space? Should corporations govern space settlements? What about space war? Are we headed for a housing crisis on the Moon’s Peaks of Eternal Light—and what happens if you’re left in the Craters of Eternal Darkness? Why do astronauts love taco sauce? Speaking of meals, what’s the legal status of space cannibalism?
Dr. Kelly Weinersmith received her PhD in Ecology at the University of California Davis, and is an adjunct faculty member in the BioSciences Department at Rice University. She studies parasites that manipulate the behavior of their hosts, and her research has been featured in The Atlantic, National Geographic, BBC World, Science, and Nature. When she isn’t studying Nature’s creepiest wonders, Kelly is writing books with her husband, Zach Weinersmith (creator of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal Comics). Their first book, Soonish: Ten Emerging Technologies That’ll Improve and/or Ruin Everything, was a New York Times Bestseller.
Zach Weinersmith is the cartoonist behind the popular geek webcomic, Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal. He co-wrote the New York Times bestseller Soonish: Ten Emerging Technologies That’ll Improve and/or Ruin Everything and illustrated the New York Times-bestselling Open Borders: The Science and Ethics of Immigration. His work has been featured by The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, Slate, Forbes, Science Friday, Foreign Policy, PBS, Boingboing, the Freakonomics Blog, the RadioLab blog, Entertainment Weekly, Mother Jones, CNN, Discovery Magazine,
