Author Description

This beautifully illustrated memoir tells artist Michelle Ott's true story of falling in love and discovering her place in the universe on a remote research station in Antarctica. In 2004, feeling burned out and dissatisfied, Michelle Ott left her high-profile gallery job in New York to work as a janitor at McMurdo Station in Antarctica: the coldest, windiest, driest place on Earth. There, she fell in love--not only with her future partner, but with the raw, inhospitable, incomparable beauty of the continent itself. She took trips to nowhere on the Antarctic ice and mapped out the most romantic date locations on a remote research base where the sun never sets. She witnessed the bright green aurora australis at -30°F, cried in response to its beauty, and found her eyes frozen shut by her tears. She learned about (literally) breathtaking katabatic winds, ventifacts, and what it was like to bake cookies for 1000. She dropped a piece of glacier ice into a glass of booze and consumed the ancient air bubbles that were trapped within it. In this emotional blend of art, science, and deeply personal stories, Ott shares the wisdom and wonder gleaned from her four trips to the southernmost continent. Complete with hand-drawn maps and diagrams, accessible scientific explanations, and the realizations that can only come from turning your life upside down, Outer Space Is Closer Than Antarctica is an ode to explorers and dreamers, scientists and artists, and anyone curious enough to brave the unknown. FOR THE EXPLORER AND THE DREAMER: Who hasn't fantasized about quitting their job, leaving city life behind, and running away to the wilderness? We might not all choose Antarctica as our dream destination, but Michelle Ott's brave, open-hearted approach to life still speaks to that nagging impulse to flip your world upside down. Her story o