Elon Musk

Two Years in the Room With Elon Musk

Walter Isaacson's #1 New York Times bestseller is the close-range portrait of the most argued-over builder of the last twenty years. For two years Isaacson shadowed Musk through Tesla, SpaceX, the AI fight, and the Twitter takeover that became X. He sat in the meetings, walked the factories, and talked to family, friends, coworkers, and enemies. What he came back with is less a victory lap than a map of the man's operating system.

The Playground Never Left

When Elon Musk was a kid in South Africa, he was regularly beaten by bullies. One day a group pushed him down some concrete steps and kicked him until his face was a swollen ball of flesh. He was in the hospital for a week. The physical damage was the smaller part. His father — an engineer, a rogue, a charismatic fantasist — left the deeper mark. Isaacson treats that childhood as the source code: a tough, volatile man with a high tolerance for risk, a craving for drama, an epic sense of mission, and a maniacal intensity that can turn callous.

By the start of 2022 Musk had launched thirty-one SpaceX rockets in a year, sold a million Teslas, and become the richest man on earth. He was also already secretly buying Twitter. Isaacson's question is the one the rest of the book is built to answer: are the demons that drive Musk also what it takes to drive the work?

About This Edition

Author: Walter Isaacson
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 688
Published: September 12, 2023
ISBN: 9781982181284