Longlisted for the National Book Award 2024
‘Passionate and absorbing’
SUNDAY TIMES
‘I learned more about the Moon by reading this book than after a lifetime of study’
CHRIS HADFIELD, author of An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth
‘Superb: as much a feat of imagination as it is a work of globe-trotting scholarship’
TELEGRAPH
‘Boyle’s writing shines, shifting through time and space, science and sentiment; a luminous read’
REBECCA WRAGG SYKES, author of Kindred
‘You will never look at the Moon the same way again . . . fascinating’
NEW STATESMAN
‘A riveting feat of science writing’
ED YONG, author of An Immense World
‘Engrossing’
INDEPENDENT
Every living being throughout history, across time and geography, has gazed up at the same moon.
From the first prehistoric life that crawled onto land guided by the power of the tides, to the division of time into months and seasons for the first humans, the moon has driven the expansion and development of our world.
It has inspired scientific discovery and culture from the ancient astronomers to the scientific revolution of Copernicus and Galileo, from the 1969 Apollo landings to writers and artists, and stirred an inexhaustible desire to know where we come from and how we got here.
And as astronauts around the world prepare to return to the Moon – opening up new frontiers of discovery, profit and politics – Our Moon tells the dazzling story of how the Moon has shaped life as we know it, fuelled dramatic change across the globe and could be the key to humanity’s future.
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Reviews
With a remarkable command of planetary science and human history Boyle provides a sweeping, lyrical new account of our cosmic neighbour, brilliantly reframing our relationship to a moon that intimately shaped, and continues to shape, the course of life on Earth
An excellent exploration of how the moon has shaped life on Earth . . . Boyle's dexterous blend of science and cultural history is elevated by her spry prose. This illuminates
I learned more about the Moon by reading this book than after a lifetime of study. Fascinating insights into the Moon's origins and history, but more than that, what it has meant to us, the people of Earth. This book is a must-read for anyone who has looked up at the Moon in wonder
Glinting with intriguing facts and fascinating connections, Our Moon reveals the astoundingly intimate relations between the closest heavenly body, the Earth and all life as we know it. Boyle's writing shines, shifting through time and space, science and sentiment; a luminous read
Our celestial neighbour has been like an invisible hand shaping tidal cycles, life's rhythms, and evolutionary history for over four billion years. Epic in scope - and almost poetic in its narrative beauty - Rebecca Boyle's Our Moon will change how you think about our planet, the Moon, and ourselves
The Moon lights both our days and our nights, present in the sky roughly half of our lives - and always orbiting, bound to our planet. We often forget, though, that the Moon is also bound to us, and we to it. Rebecca Boyle's Our Moon is a vivid and moving exploration of that lunar impact, showing how influential the pockmarked orb is and always has been. Boyle traces the Moon's civilizational importance from the beginning of terrestrial life to modern human society, revealing not just the scientific knowledge of that history but how humans made those discoveries, and why they matter. Our Moon is both robustly reported and compellingly personal. Inside its pages, past and present collide, and science and storytelling become one, as Boyle draws Earth's nearest neighbour closer to its inhabitants
In telling the tale of Earth's oldest companion, Rebecca Boyle offers an absorbing account of the human experience, from the depths of philosophy to the trenches of war. Deftly written with a poet's precision and scientific sensibility, Our Moon establishes Boyle as one of preeminent nature writers of our time
Our Moon is a riveting feat of science writing, which recasts that most familiar of celestial objects into something eerily extraordinary, pivotal to our history, and awesome in the original sense of the word. I learned so much
Boyle explores humanity's changing relationship to the Moon: from worshipping it as a god, to observing, exploring and then walking upon its desolate surface. This is a beautiful, evocative hymn to the intimate connection we have shared with our planet's cosmic companion
Our Moon is superb: as much a feat of imagination as it is a work of globe-trotting scholarship
Boyle makes good on her promise: after reading this book, you will never look at the moon the same way again . . . fascinating
Boyle's long-standing fascination with the moon makes for an exciting read, but it also means that Our Moon is a great resource to dip back into after reading in its entirety . . . at its heart, it is a love letter to the moon
Graceful . . . timely . . . The Moon is the only piece of a vast universe that most of us will ever get to experience: All you have to do is look up. Or, of course, look down into Boyle's new book, which makes the moon feel closer than ever
Our Moon skilfully combines science, anecdote and philosophy . . . This engrossing book tells us so much about the Moon and space exploration, but it also encourages readers to ponder on our planet and our insignificant place in the universe
Delightful . . . The moon, as this passionate and absorbing book shows, is both fascinatingly strange and very much part of us
An aeon-spanning opus . . . fascinating and revelatory
Boyle's fascinating debut explores our scientific and cultural relationship with the moon
Poetic . . . fascinating . . . especially timely
Boyle inventories the ways in which the Moon's presence affects life on Earth - influencing menstrual cycles, dictating the timing of D Day - and how humans' conception of it has evolved . . . Throughout, the author orbits a central idea: that understanding the science and the history of the Moon may help to unlock mysteries elsewhere in the universe