Made for an interesting read. A very detailed insight into one of the most prolific entrepreneurs of our times. Very well researched and written.

The world needs people like Musk to come around every now and then. Someone who does not compromise. Someone who puts achieving his ambitions and goals above everything else. Someone who can put aside emotion, think objectively, and possess a level of conviction that will ensure an end goal is achieved no matter the cost.

“The perceived lack of emotion is a symptom of Musk sometimes feeling like he’s the only one who really grasps the urgency of his mission. He’s less sensitive and less tolerant than other people because the stakes are so high. Employees need to help solve the problems to the absolute best of their ability or they need to get out of the way”

Sure, perhaps he won’t garner the love and respect of all those he encounters, but even the most zealous detractors can’t deny how much he has achieved in such a short amount of time. He’s single-handedly helped advance mankind and the prospects of what they can achieve. He’s certainly made me more excited about the near future, during a time where any extreme advancement (not just the generation of a new app) just didn’t seem likely to come around anytime soon.

Ashlee Vance does a superb job of providing enlightenment on Musk and his rise to fame, as well as the part he has played in key industries in what is essentially a reasonably short career thus far. We can only hope that his career runs for a very long time, to the benefit of us all.

Thanks NetGalley and Penguin Random House for a review copy.

I have no idea what attracted me to reading this book – I knew next to nothing about Elon Musk and have no interest in cars or space travel. So I was pleasantly surprised to find the subject areas becoming quite intriguing. It even led me quite excitedly to watch the live launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 (yeah I know…)
Hailed as the real life Tony Stark, this is a fascinating look at what drives (no pun intended) Musk and how his uniquely gifted attitude to business as well as life has contributed so greatly to the overwhelming success of Paypal, Tesla and SpaceX to name but three. A very quick yet interesting read if you like science, technology, biographies or if you just want to save the planet.

An interesting read for me, considering I never went in depth into what Musk has accomplished (to be fair, I came to this book because I find Tesla cars sexy and thought ‘well, why not read this, at least I’ll know more about the man’).

I’m kind of sitting on the fence about this book. I liked learning about how Musk’s companies came to be, the problems encountered along the way, how things were at times one inch from just failing, but worked out in the end, out of both luck and determination. In a way, it’s a positive ‘lesson’: that sometimes things fail, but it shouldn’t prevent you from fighting for them and taking risks, because they just may succeed as well.

I also appreciated that the author interviewed other people, employees, ex-employees, friends, ex-partners, etc., and that he made them part of the whole: people without whom Tesla Motors or SpaceX wOuld’ve never been able to take off, engineers and mechanics and designers whose role was absolutely not negligible. Since a large part of the book was focused on these companies, acknowledging more than just one actor was a good thing to do.

I would’ve d liked it to go more in depth about how exactly things worked out, when it comes to the science/engineering part. Elon Musk seems like he knows his stuff, too, and has learnt over the years what he didn’t know and made him shoot for impossible deadlines at first (now I guess they’re just improbable, hah), and… I don’t know, I expected something more detailed in that regard. Maybe less of the business aspect, and more about the engineering the way Elon Musk himself goes about it?

Also, for a biography, I think it didn’t go to the bottom of things either when it comes to the man, and lacks a certain detachment. Musk doesn’t come off as a very empathetic person, to say the least, and while objectively I understand his drive, humanely the way he treats his employees is, well, not great at all. So I would’ve been interested in seeing more reflecting about this: coming from him, but also coming from the biographer. There -is- something wrong in the way all these visionary projects have come to be, and it was pretty much glossed over. (In short, was the harshness really needed, does innovation has to come to such a price, and would things have tanked with just a bit more empathy?)

This was instructive, and I kind of liked it, so 3 stars… But while I know more about Tesla Motors, SolarCity and SpaceX, I don’t feel like I know -that- much more about Musk himself now.

Despite being a relatively recent book it's startling how much has changed since the publication.

As I write this SpaceX are reading Falcon 9 Block 5 is ready to start a static fire test - Musk calls it the final major revision of the Falcon 9 rocket. They've relaunched previously flown rockets. Landing the rockets is now regarded as routine instead of experimental. While over at Tesla, the Model X, which is nearing completion in the book, has been released to much acclaim.

Such developments are relatively minor in the story of Elon Musk though. This is a fascinating book that collates many of the stories, some bordering on myths and legends, about Musk and puts them out in an impressively neutral package. That neutrality is very powerful here. Although it's clear that Vance came to know Musk well and undoubtedly developed a form of fondness for the man, the book is unafraid to point out criticisms. No doubt some detractors will regard it as an easy ride for Musk, but it is nice to see these areas looked at, sometimes a lot deeper than I would expect.

It makes for a great read, and although we don't get much of a picture of Musk's early life in South Africa things start to come into focus when he moves to North America and we get to start following the story of his companies and innovations. Personally, I felt this section filled in some of the aspects of Musk's career that are generally only mentioned fleetingly these days - Zip2 and x.com (and the transition into PayPal). It's not that these days are shrouded in mystery as much as Musk seems to be forever doing new things and there is less and less space each article to look back on his early days. The book allowed Vance to stretch his legs a bit and actually recount and uncover stories that are hard to justify covering in anything shorter.

And then the era for which Musk is most know - SpaceX, Tesla, SolarCity. Again, for truly avid Musk fans I suspect new insights will be rarer, but for most of us, there is a chance to learn a bit more about the early days of these companies, especially before the spotlights burned as brightly on them. Some things are really not surprising, others are more insightful.

Curiously though, whilst Musk is the constant thread of these stories, there is a greater focus on the companies. Of course, that's inevitable when looking at a man so embedded into his career. But, especially in the latter parts of the book, Musk drifts somewhat into the background of his own story. We see him more through the progress of the companies than at any other stage in the book. That's not to say Musk vanishes, it just merges more with the companies than previously.

And that's where Musk is in most mindsets these days - the man and the businesses have largely become a single entity. Musk is still very prominent in everything SpaceX does, and although he'd become less omnipresent in Tesla news even that has changed recently and he's back in the headlines for that company too, with stories of him sleeping on the factory floor as he tries to get the Model 3 production sorted and claiming that he underestimated the value of people.

That's the worst part of reading this book right now. Although it brings us very close to now in the Musk story he keeps it moving at a breakneck speed. I'd love to have this book covering those current Tesla issues. Musk moves so fast there's no way to avoid a gap between publication and reading that he could easily fill with some momentous news. That difficulty is what makes the book so interesting though. If he worked at a sedate pace that meant a book could feel fresh for years he wouldn't be as interesting to read about. And Vance did a great job of capturing that intrigue and momentum. It's a book that reminds you someone like Musk can't be captured in a news cycle, he's someone who needs pages and pages, and footnotes upon footnotes, o even scratch the surface. And I don't doubt that if Vance does write a follow-up I'll want to read that too.

I'm not normally one for biographies but was interested to read an insight to an interesting character in the world of business. Enjoyed the back story and interaction with people providing info for the book. Not sure how true the image is represented but an enjoyable book

I have found Vance's writing style engaging, and finished the book in a week. I am a massive fan of what Elon Musk has done and will continue to achieve.in his lifetime. After finishing the book I feel like my eyes have been opened to what is possible and encouraged me to look further into the amazing discoveries being made by inspiring people,

This was an interesting book. I enjoyed very much learning more about a man who has been in the news so much. Fascinating and inspiring. I'm have no hesitation in recommending this.

I obtained a copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Whether you follow him or his companies/works, Elon Musk is an important innovator of our times, and I would suggest everyone to read this book to get inspired or experience another world.
I really admire how Vance captured his biography, which is not an easy thing to do. If you read a little bit, you'll understand Musk is not the most easy going person in the world. The author opens the book in a very intriguing way starting from why Musk allowed him to write his biography, which starts to shed some light into his character.
It was really interesting to read about how SpaceX, Tesla and all his other success stories started, how he jumped from one ambition to another, and how he runs his companies. Obviously, Musk is no normal person. He runs after his heart, and his dreams. He's not only after making a lot of money, but he wishes a self-sufficient world before he leaves it himself. I do admire how he uses his intellect, his efforts and resources to do innovations that would be good for the earth. Clean technology, colonisation in Mars, solar power, etc.

He's probably one of the most persistent person I've ever read about. All the difficulties he's thrown at would make any one of us to give up, but he still goes after his dreams. He's tough, both on himself and his employees. It's not easy to work for him. But, yet again, it's also not easy to aim to change how the world operates. So, we can't expect ordinary from him.

All in all, I would really suggest this book to anybody. It's interesting, fascinating, very well captured inner world of this genius I truly admired even more than before I read this book.

Thanks a lot to NetGalley and the publisher for granting a free copy in exchange for an honest review.