Moonseed

AFTERWORD

Kent Joosten of the Solar System Exploration Division, NASA Johnson Space Center, was once again extremely generous in hosting my research at JSC and taking me through the modern mission studies which formed the basis of the lunar expedition featured here, and also reading drafts of the manuscript later; thanks also to Eric Brown for reading a draft. I’m indebted for assistance with the Edinburgh-based sections of this book to Dr Roger Scrutton, head of the Department of Geology and Geophysics, Edinburgh University; and to Peter Willdridge, Emergency Planning Officer, Buckinghamshire.

NASA’s Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, annotated transcripts of the Apollo missions, is available online and was an invaluable source on the astronauts” experience of the Moon. I learned about lunar geology and resources from Paul Spudis’s Once and Future Moon (1996), The Lunar Source Book ed. G.H. Heiken (1991), Lunar Bases and Space Activities in the 21st Century ed. W. Mendell (1986) and other references. The unlikely art of harenodynamics was suggested by Krafft Ehricke in a paper printed in Lunar Bases. Terraforming the Moon has been explored by Martyn Fogg in his masterly Terraforming (1995) and by earlier authors; I’m indebted to Martyn for his blunt review of an early draft of my terraforming scenario here.

Any errors are, of course, all mine.

It seems we really could get back to the Moon for under two billion dollars. The Moonseed may not be waiting for us — but a sister world is.

Stephen Baxter

Great Missenden

March 1998