Mars Rovers is a whimsical Sci-Fi novella. If you're looking for an exciting journey, witty jokes, and unexpected plot twists, this is the book for you. It's a prequel, introducing new characters and some rather eccentric aliens. It begins with the US President being woken in the early hours, to be informed that aliens have been spotted on Mars, and they're doing something unexpected. Very unexpected.

If you enjoy science fiction, like to be amused, and are open to a little nonsense, then read Mars Rovers. The story was written for the author's 11-year-old daughter, so is child safe, but has several references that are more likely to resonate with parents.

Extract:

Humans had been dreaming about space exploration for millennia. The ancient Greeks had done the calculations, but they lacked the machinery to even attempt to build a working vehicle. By 1865, Jules Verne, a French novelist, wrote From the Earth to the Moon. He included the rudimentary maths, and a design, which were years ahead of their time. It wouldn't have worked; it was unlikely to have escaped Earth's gravity, and even if it had, the crew would have been killed by the g-force.

During World War Two, the Nazis built the V2 rockets. They were bombs, used to blitz the Brits. After the war, their designs were adapted to build the first space rockets. The main protagonists where the USA and Soviet Union. They were engaged in a Cold War, a clash of ideologies, democracy vs communism. Short-term achievements were more important than sensible planning and design. Essentially, their big idea, was to strap a few daring people to a large bomb and point it towards the sky.

By the end of the century, the Cold War was over, the Soviet Union had collapsed, and NASA no longer had astronomical budgets. The tech entrepreneurs took over. Commercial space travel couldn't afford disposable rockets. This was a eureka moment. The secret was a simple calculation called the escape velocity. It stated that for a rocket launched from the Earth's surface to escape its gravitational pull, it would need an initial speed of 25,000 mph. This required a really, really, big bomb. A few smart people realised that if they piggy-backed a space rocket on a jumbo jet, and launched it from high altitude, they could use a much smaller bomb. This was progress, the humans were on their way.