The next space race has arrived—driven by rival nations, billionaire-funded ventures, and breakthrough technologies all vying to alter the balance of power on Earth and beyond.

"This isn’t science fiction; it’s the blueprint for the world we’re about to inherit.” —Ali Velshi, NBC News senior economic and business correspondent and anchor for MS NOW

In 2024, the Odysseus lander touched down near the south pole of the Moon. It was the first lunar landing by Americans in more than half a century—and the first ever by a private company. “Odie” embodied the ambitions of a new genera­tion of space entrepreneurs, as well as Washington’s bid to challenge a rising Beijing. A gateway to interplanetary explo­ration and conquest, the Moon is now also open for busi­ness, and the race to level up technology, secure resources, and build off-world infrastructure has begun.

First place isn’t just a symbolic win, but a strategic path to influence and control. The United States, although turbo­charged by tech elites, risks being outpaced by China, which increasingly aligns commercial enterprise with national secu­rity. Not far behind are Russia, India, Japan, and the Euro­pean Union.

In Open Space, journalist and space industry analyst David Ariosto gives us a front-row seat to the future. With unprecedented access, he recounts the split-second deci­sions in mission control and hold-your-breath moments on the launch pad. He travels from research labs orchestrating our planetary defense to an antimatter factory and the Mars Desert Research Station, where scientists imagine how an off-world colony might survive (it involves a diet of bugs). He probes inside the Chinese space sector itself, meeting with key figures and companies and traveling to a remote military station in South America. In this global odyssey, we meet the visionaries who are dreaming up the future and the engineers and physicists who are making science fiction a reality.

After millennia of gazing up at the stars, humanity is now forging the tools to travel among them. Propulsive, awe-inspiring, and poignant, Open Space charts this epic journey to the final frontier and looks for our place within it.