Join Mia on a journey of galactic proportions as you leave planet Earth behind and blast off into outer space. Planets, stars, constellations, belts, meteors, asteroids, the International Space Station, the Milky Way and far off galaxies are just waiting to be discovered. So put your space suit on, strap yourself in and start the countdown. It is time to launch…5, 4, 3, 2, 1…

An Adventurer’s Guide to Outer Space is a superbly informative and engaging read with plenty of opportunities for readers to get actively involved. Budding astronomers, wanna-be astronauts and all those children that just want to have a better understanding of the cosmos and what exists in space will thoroughly enjoy.

A fabulous foreword by Lucy Hawking, the daughter of Stephen Hawking, welcomes readers before astronaut Mia takes over and becomes our guide. Our journey starts on planet Earth before we hop aboard a rocket and blast off into space, learning about the rocket launching process as we go. Mia guides her spaceship to the different parts of the cosmos as we are taken on a joinery that is quite literally out of this world. 

Each double page spread focuses on a particular part of the cosmos. Pages are bursting with star-mazing facts, space-tacular information and expert guide Mia is always on hand to share her own space wisdom. I particularly loved learning from Mia that if you were on board the International Space Station you would see sixteen sunrises and sixteen sunsets every day, that it takes Neptune 156 Earth years to make one trip around the Sun and if you were able to drive from Earth to the Moon it would take about 23 weeks! A brilliant ‘Space Adventure’ feature that is part of every double page provides opportunities for readers to get actively involved and will have children pretending to be a planet orbiting the sun, designing their own spacesuit, exploring air pressure and seeing if they can move as fast as a rocket!

The production of this book is first class and the first thing you notice when venturing into the book is the quality of the paper that it is produced on. Pages are thick and will hold up to endless hours of exploration. The stunning endpapers are a thing of beauty showing star constellations complete with names and will have children gazing into the night sky trying to spot Draco, Taurus, Hydra and Eridanus. A handy glossary with perfectly pitched explanations completes the book.

One of the best introductions to space and the cosmos for young readers that I have seen in a long time.

Recommended for 5+.