Examining the 50 coolest, most stylish, and most popular futuristic inventions, this handbook peers through the lens of today’s science, looking at which ones have become reality and how they work, and which are still in the imagined future—will we ever get to ride our jetpacks? From prototype to realization, the technological evolution of each invention—such as the Star Trek communicator, which has become today’s cell phone; the robot pets of Dr. Who; Vanilla Sky's cryonics; and even Sleeper’s orgasmatron—is charted in this veritable history of the future.

Nick Sagan is the son of astronomer Carl Sagan and the author of the bestselling sci-fi novels Edenborn, Everfree, and Idlewild. He writes screenplay adaptations of science fiction, animation episodes, and computer games for studios such as Paramount, Warner Brothers, Universal, and Disney, as well as for Tom Cruise's and Martin Scorsese's production companies. He lives in Ithaca, New York. Mark Frary is a science and technology writer. He is the coauthor of Codebreaker: The Secret History of Communication. Andy Walker is the author of Absolute Beginner's Guide to Security, Spam, Spyware and Viruses and a cohost and coproducer of the video podcast Lab Rats. He lives in Toronto.