This is detailed enough and intimate enough with the subject matter that it is only a rewrite away from being one of those Haynes Owner Manuals to the red planet. We get a lot of history, however, rather than technical information – the history of both our knowledge and thinking of the place, including the more successful missions there, and the history that we can work out of the ancient geology there. The two combined are a source of some quite remarkable trivia – Martian polar ice caps were discovered before the terran ones were fully known about; maps of Mars featured a handy prime meridian feature decades before Earth's did.

After that we get a look at how to, well, look at Mars – decent telescope debate is accompanied by astrophotography advice. Video processing software being detailed shows this really can be a book to give something to a lot of different readers. The fourth and final chunk is where we can come in where the science is concerned – not only what is going on around us to get humans there for the first time, but the ways we can access archived data, and even work as a citizen scientist on teaching ground rovers how to identify and steer round problematic terrain.

It's readably presented, at a kind of GCSE-level, to guess, and while it might stand out as seeming prejudicial – there are no sister books at this level to other planets – that's because we know this much about the place because it is the easiest to learn about. And pretty much what a layman might want to learn about Planet #4 is on these pages. A strong, pictorial four stars.

This is a great read! It’s more accessible to read than other similar books I’ve read and you can tell that it was incredibly throughly researched.

The writing is clear and makes you really engaged with the text. Sometimes with books of this nature it can be quite dry to read but thankfully this was not the case. I loved the graphics included too! Definitely a book you can gift to the space lover in your life! Loved it :)

A great read, especially for beginners to the subject. Though my interests may not be specifically on Mars itself, it has definitely encouraged me to look into it further.

An all-encompassing, engaging and accessible book about the Red planet.
The elements such as the atlas, the graphics, photos, and the evolution of the planet stood out for me.
I read some parts with my 9yo child and they were interested in the future of Mars, life on Mars aspects.
Extensive research went into this book as it shows, and the different perspectives and the interdisciplinary nature of it make for an interesting read. It is also a great gift idea and a title that deserves to be revisited thanks to its rich content and coverage.