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How I killed Pluto and why I had it coming 

 “How I killed Pluto and why I had it coming” by Mike Brown is a compelling tale about explorers of the modern day. The fact that I hadn’t even heard of a 2nd dwarf planet despite being quite up to date regarding space news, is somewhat disconcerting. Especially seeing as after further research I even realised that there are actually 5 dwarf planets like Pluto all but the latter discovered in recent years. This is somewhat saddening to me, first because of my lack of knowledge on the matter and second because this tale made me realise that there is so much being discovered nowadays that a massive body in the Kuiper belt is barely interesting enough to make the news, let alone school books. But it also fills me with wonder as there is so much being discovered nowadays that a massive object in the Kuiper belt is almost another Tuesday. 

I chose to read this book because I find the subject fascinating, and I was a little ashamed of never having heard of an almost 10th planet. I’m fascinated by outer space so this particular work naturally appealed to me, but I was not expecting such a personal retelling of the events leading up to the discovery. For better or worse this is the story of Mike Brown before that of Planet X. I admit I was looking for a slightly more scientific read but nonetheless I have learned much of astronomy from that novel and the subsequent interest it has sparked in me. Admittedly, the novel on its own gives moderate amounts of scientific information, but the sheer wonder that Mike Brown is able to translate through his work has prompted me to look into the matter much more deeply in my own time. To me this is the most valuable aspect of his work.