5 comments about The Mercury 13: The Untold Story of Thirteen American Women and the Dream of Space Flight.

1. I am an admirer of this fascinatingly readable, lucid and scholarly book, with some very interesting stories of intriguing people. However I found a much superior assessment of the "Mercury 13" program in Burgess and French's book Into That Silent Sea: Trailblazers of the Space Era, 1961-1965 (Outward Odyssey: A People's History of S). In one extraordinary chapter, they capture the true cultural, historical and social context of this program far better than this entire book-length treatment. They also contrast the Soviet women in space program against American efforts far better.
   
   Nevertheless, I would still recommend this book as a very interesting read into a fascinating time in American history, and congratulate the author on her impressive research, including the fullest personal interviewing with the original candidates ever undertaken.



2. "We seek only a place in our Nation's space future without discrimination. We ask as citizens of this Nation to be allowed to participate with seriousness and sincerity in the making of history now... We offer you thirteen women pilot volunteers." Jerrie Cobb, pilot and space enthusiast, in her testimony to Congress
   
   "I believe that we should give serious consideration to the inclusion of women among our future astronauts." Congressman Ken Hechler
   
   "Let them vote. Let them wear pants. Let them shoot pool. But please, Mr. Vice President, don't let them get into space." Dallas Times Herald science writer
   
   "Another question that I am frequently asked is this...'Do you ever plan to use women astronauts in your program?' Well, all I can say is that the male astronauts are all for it... we're reserving 110 pounds of payload for recreational equipment." Wernher von Braun
   
   "Lets Stop This Now!" Vice President Lyndon Johnson, on NASA testing women astronaut candidates.
   
   
   This is a well-documented, and depressing, book on the exclusion of women as potential US astronauts in the early decades of the US space program. Martha Ackmann has revealed the underbelly of a male-dominated NASA program, and its impacts on the hopes and dreams of qualified women who craved to be allowed to serve their country and blast into space.
   
   My heart bleeds for Jerrie Cobb and the loss of her dream. I nominate Ms. Cobb for the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her dedication.
   
   After reading Ackmann's book, I think you will agree. My only complaint is that the passion of the times is lost in Ackman's dry, academic writing style (too often, it was distracting). I thank her, however, for pulling the history of the Mercury 13 together.



3. The book does a poor job depicting a key part in women's history. The history itself is not boring or confusing at all. In fact the story of the Mercury 13 women is very interesting and should be taught to everyone. Reading this book is a tiresome and irksome task for even an veteran reader. Martha Ackmann mutilated a historical event. She turned an epic struggle into a unrecognizable, confusing, monster of a book that the average person cannot clearly and decisively comprehend.



4. "The Mercury 13" is an amazing story of how [discrimination] in the early years of the American space program shut women out. We should be ashamed that the Soviet Union had a woman in space decades before Sally Ride finally broke the gender barrier in the U.S. Martha Ackmann is to be congratulated for bringing the stories of these incredible and patriotic women to light.



5. Research, research, research...

   Ms. Ackmann has really done her homework on all the players involved in the Mercury 13 or FLAT (First Lady Astronaut Trainee) program. She did extensive personal interviewing with the surviving women of the program, and it shows.

   Her writing gets you "into" the story and you won't want to put it down.
   A classic example of truth being stranger than fiction. Now that we have the luxury of time to look back on these events, besides blaming the social conditions of the times, possibly this book can now serve as a benchmark of lessons learned and hopefully not to be repeated.

   Highly recommend for every parent of girls and boys. Read it to your kids, and help them understand what happened.

   Check this book out, now.

   As an archive Librarian I have a great appreciation for the work that went into this book. It is a GREAT READ! And you won't be disappointed.

   Remember....all others came after this one.

   Enjoy!

5 comments about Light This Candle: The Life & Times of Alan Shepard--America's First Spaceman.

1. Not much about Al Shepard that isn't already in other books
   and movies. And just plain wrong on obvious things like
   Grissom's pickup --which is on tape. How do you screw
   something like that up? Short on technical details
   and a lot of rehash on the Glen rivalry.
   
   The constant repetitive mentioning of Al's sexual business is a bit weird.
   Especially since only two real instances are mentioned in the book,
   and neither of them involved sex. The supposed suppressed T.J. scandal
   (John Glenn saves the day) is total horsecrap too, never happened.



2. Surprise of surprises. Amid the clutter of hastily-written self-serving memoirs from the early days of the space program, finally there appears something akin to solid history and literary proficiency. Neal Thompson was a Baltimore reporter when Alan Shepard died in 1998 of leukemia. Assigned to write an obituary, Thompson discovered that no first rate biography of the United State's first spaceman was then in print. Sensing an opportunity, Thompson, a free lance writer, began a six-year research project and produced a highly respectable treatment of a very private man. What had been known about Shepard were primarily his great successes and his notable shortcomings. Johnson tackles the great middle--and the puzzle that was Alan Shepard now begins to make sense.
   
   In truth, there is probably misunderstanding about all of the early astronaut heroes, as if each was assigned a role in a bigger cosmic drama. Scotty Carpenter will always be the house philosopher, Gordo Cooper the hotdog, Gus Grissom the curmudgeon. Shepard's role was to be first, the best, the winner of a grueling marathon to ride the Redstone rocket--tiny by today's standards--for fifteen minutes on May 5, 1961. Given the unpredictability of the rockets of that era, the greater risk to the astronaut was on the ground than in space. This fact was appreciated in 1961, and being chosen number one was a statement from his superiors about his fortitude as much as his mastery of flying and technology.
   
   Alan Shepard was born in 1923 in Derry, NH, to a somewhat removed, demanding father. Young Shepard inherited a fierce competitiveness and an independence that allowed him to pursue personal goals with little concern about his impression on others. This latter quality, to his advantage, is what set him apart from his archrival John Glenn, who did worry about public relations. Shepard was one of those rare men who had his cake and ate it, too: he achieved remarkable career goals while entertaining himself along the way with what can only be called oppositional defiance. In a strange twist of history, he actually pulled off the mischief that has always been attached to others like Gordon Cooper.
   
   In this regard Thompson studies Shepard's military misbehavior and his philandering. The author's account of the future astronaut's brushes with military authority is detailed and rather surprising. One comes away with a sense that the New Hampshire flyboy's skills as a naval test pilot must have been noteworthy, outweighing numerous dangerous incidents of "flat-hatting" or strafing civilians on the ground. His cheating on his virtuous and devoted wife Louise--a spouse of the Lady Bird Johnson mold--is a blotch that time will probably not erase. Thompson does observe that Shepard's amorous sorties off the reservation were adolescent in nature; the astronaut apparently never engaged in any sort of long term relationship in which Louise was displaced.
   
   Although there is in this work a lot about Shepard to dislike, the author clearly strove for a balanced presentation. Shepard appears to have made his peace with Glenn at the time of the Freedom Seven flight. After retirement he demonstrated a better than average interest in philanthropy and seems to have worked harder in his later years to enrich his marriage with Louise. Perhaps best known is his decade long battle with Meniere's Disease, and later with a form of leukemia. In some ways the Meniere's was more of a psychological jolt, coming as it did at the beginning of the Gemini, and ultimately, the Apollo Programs. Whatever his colleagues felt about him, Shepard was widely respected in the NASA management circle for outstanding cape com work in the troubled Carpenter and Cooper flights. With Glenn, his chief rival, out of the picture due to a head injury and political considerations, Shepard was the logical choice to command the maiden voyages of these new craft--and by implication become the first man to walk on the moon.
   
   But this was not to be. For nearly a decade Shepard lost his license to fly any type of aircraft due to balance impairment [and other less known medical problems brought to light by the author.] Did he take this forced grounding graciously? Admittedly not. But the author assesses this period of Shepard's career with more depth than other commentators. He notes, for example, that Shepard had burned his bridges with the Navy by joining NASA and could not return to what seemed to be a straight road to admiralty status. While the Navy was no longer an option, Shepard was proving himself to be a better than average business man and becoming independently wealthy. Freed of aviator-astronaut responsibilities, he could have lived a highly lucrative lifestyle.
   
   But he stayed with NASA, a nasty Don Quixote. Only a man in similar straits like Deke Slayton, himself medically grounded from space travel, could have understood and tolerated his subaltern's angry depression which alienated other astronauts in the program and at times rendered him a public relations nightmare. What sustained him through his bureaucratic Siberia was the desire to return to active status, but perhaps more strongly a desire to conquer his own medical problem. Shepard would admit that his selection for the first Mercury flight was the professional highlight of his career. Reinstatement to flight status for Apollo was for him a personal triumph of a different sort,
   
   Shepard was due for some luck. Experimental surgery put him on line for Apollo 13, but management bumped him to 14 to absorb training and thus he avoided the near catastrophic events of unlucky 13. Shepard seemed grateful to be back--choosing for his Apollo 14 crew Stu Roosa, who had defined the art of avoiding Shepard in company hallways. Apollo 14 survived at least three mission-threatening crises on its way to the world's most famous tee shot. What the author shares about the moon landing mission is one of its least known achievements: it brought its commander to tears.



3. I am a "space nut". I have read numerous books, seen numerous vhs and dvd stories of everything from the start of the space age to the shuttle flights. I have never had a more inspiring feeling than upon finishing "Light this candle". It started a little slow with all the early life details of Shepard but, helped later in the book with how & why he reacted to many (and I mean many) tough situations that he faced in his unbelievable life. Being a space nut, I was happy to see little details explained in the book that are lacking in other books I have read. Such things as Shepard talking about laying in the LEM following an EVA on Apollo 14. He and Mitchell were supposed to be sleeping but Shepard talked about the "eerie silence" and hearing the A/C unit click on and off. Also, feeling like they were going to tilt over and falling out of the bunk when he thought the LEM was sliding down the edge of the crater. All of these things made it a "tough to put down" book that I would HIGHLY recommend.
   I used to think of Al Shepard as an egotistical, bi-polar, spoiled fly-boy that I wanted no part in learning more about. I would have rather stuck to anyone of the other 6 Mercury astronauts. BOY WAS I WRONG! This book might have turned me to thinking that Al Shepard is the most interesting of the original 7.



4. I had been meaning to read this long-overdue biography of Alan Shepard, and I happened to pick it up in a cruise ship library. As I read it I was surprised at the number of factual inaccuracies--there is at least one glaring non-technical error per chapter, which calls into question almost everything else between the covers. Numerous reviews here mention more problems with technical aspects of the book that I was unaware of, but which do not surprise me given the apparent lack of proofreading and fact-checking.
   
   An example: upon finding the book, I leafed through it and found the section on Apollo 14. There it mentioned that John Glenn had "almost killed himself when he lost control of the pace car at the Daytona 500 and slammed into a flatbed trailer crowded with journalists." This sentence boggled my mind, for it contained two errors: the pace car was at the Indianapolis 500, and John Glenn was a passenger while a local Dodge dealership owner was the driver. The book is just full of examples of this kind of sloppy reporting.
   
   Edit: I see that at least the paperback edition correctly says Indianapolis 500, but it still incorrectly implies that Glenn was driving the pace car.



5. I missed an opportunity to go to a book-signing where Alan Shepard was signing copies of "Moon Shot". I figured I would have another chance but then before long he was gone. What a thrill it would have been to have shook the hand of the first American in space.
   
   Nostalgia aside, this book is a capsule of the life of the man. True, it is littered with inaccuracies in spots, and seems to delve far too deeply at moments on the personal life of one of the most important men in the last 50 years. But then again, how many JFK biographers have tried to delve into the hush-hush side of the man?
   
   This book will give you a clear picture of the over-achieving, success-driven, consumate test pilot who one day became an important symbol to many Americans, who were afraid their world was about to be consumed by communism. At times wistful, sometimes aggrandizing, other times pointedly candid, this biography attempt to reveal the Alan Shepard even the man himself wanted no one to see.
   
   You will be amazed at the story.

3 comments about Footprints: The 12 Men Who Walked on the Moon Reflect on Their Flights, Their Lives, and the Future.

1. The book was written to go with the 20th anniversary of the first landing, and has interviews with 11 of the 12 moonwalkers. Neil Armstrong did not participate, so the authors included excerpts from the public record on Armstrong. Obviously, no book like this can be written today, as some have died. The authors are fortunate to have done this project then, as Jim Irwin was gone before the 25th.
   
   I strongly recommend serious Apollo fans include this in their reading list. Most likely, though, you'll never be able to, as my guess is the book did not sell well and has mostly disappeared. Grab it if you see a copy. The casual space reader would be better served by others in the excellent collection of narratives and autobiographies.
   
   The timing of the book makes for good copy years later. The American glow from the moon landings was long gone, with no follow-up toward permanent work toward the moon. The shuttle had its history of delays, and the Challenger disaster a couple years earlier had prompted re-examination of the role of space and NASA's priorities. The space station was still in the future, and the Soviets were actively working toward a permanent presence in space. Mars looked like a feasible goal that might prompt a serious commitment by now.
   
   The astronauts talk about all of those topics and more, with excellent perspective and their own biases. Their predictions vary widely. There is no mindless optimism - these are serious guys concerned about the future. Many of them offer suggestions for revitalizing the space program and/or what its priorities should be.
   
   The section for each astronaut has some basic bio information and a summary of his role in the space program and what happened in the years since. The bio material about who got what flights reminds the reader of the twists and turns that deviated from the projected crews (e.g., Bean owes his flight to the death of CC Williams). Then it's straight Q&A. Thus, the typical narrative content and weaving of a story is not here, which is what makes this different. What comes through for each astronaut is often what you might have expected. However, there is often a telling detail that I hadn't heard elsewhere.
   
   One point several agreed on is that landing the LM was a lot simpler than night landings on a carrier.
   
   Buzz Aldrin talks about his struggles after returning to earth, his relationship with his father, and re-hashes the decision of who went first. Jim Irwin talks mainly about religious aspects, as does Edgar Mitchell, along with his psychic work that became his focus post-Apollo.
   
   Shepard declines again to say whether he would have overridden the abort on Apollo 14. Mitchell says they would have. Shepard said "The Right Stuff" movie was OK, but "did a disservice to a lot of people" in how they were portrayed. Conrad agrees ("it was terrible"), while liking the book a lot. The thought of Conrad and Tom Wolfe together makes me smile.
   
   Aldrin says he wouldn't trade being on the first (short) mission for one of the last missions with the additional time on the moon, and debunks the story that he gave his second wife a piece of the moon.
   
   Conrad sadly recalls the winding down of his career in NASA ("I would have had a very tough time staying there, living under the damn ground rules by which those guys had to build the Shuttle").
   
   Mitchell's section is the longest and most philosophical, getting into man as a non-linear computer and what happens when a person dies.
   
   Bean recounts the funny story that's in "From the Earth to the Moon" where Conrad says, "Look, I don't want anybody having to take a crap on the moon....". I liked Bean's comments about the crew as a team, and the whole space program as a team. He always comes across as a good guy. Bean also did the illustrations for the book.
   
   Irwin talked a bit about the medical issues on the moon and his problems since then, all the sadder given his early death. Regarding the white "Genesis Rock": "the green rock that we brought back has an approximate age of about a half a billion years older than the white rock. So, really, the green rock should have been called the Genrics Rock, rather than the white one."
   
   Schmitt on the Challenger: "Christa McAuliffe knew exactly what she was doing. She knew what the risks were. The first teacher that went west in covered wagons probably didn't make it either. NASA just didn't know how to handle it."
   
   Scott gets asked a question I had never thought of before this book. What should happen to the landing sites when we go back some day? His interview has an excellent mix of about 90 questions.
   
   In 1989, John Young thought he might get another shuttle flight or two. Never happened. Young also said the best book by an astronaut up to that time was "The Quiet Sun" by Ed Gibson.
   
   Charlie Duke covers his religious conversion and work with Jim Irwin, et al. He and Young claim to have the land speed record on the moon in their excursions with the Rover.
   
   Always-interesting Gene Cernan shines here, too. "100, 200, 300 years from now if you look back at the time it takes between when we first went and when we go back to the moon, even if it's fifty years, it's going to be just a blip in history. So, I'm not bitter because I know it's going to happen."
   
   On a minor note, the book has too many typos for my taste.
   
   P.S. My copy of the book is signed by Shepard, Bean, Cernan and author MacKinnon.



2. this was, to my knowledge, the first book done on all 12 moonwalkers,/together, and which tells about the men, their respective missions,and rest of lives,upto late 1980's!what they achieved as astronauts,men, and how they ended upin later life! interesting!



3. This book tells the reader a little about all 12 men that walked on the Moon, and their reflections of their experience, their lives a little, and how Project Apollo and being an astronaut changed their lives forever! Could read 1000 books like this one, and never get tired of it

5 comments about Sojourner: An Insider's View of the Mars Pathfinder Mission.

1. On the good side, it is fairly well written. As a previous reviewer noted, however, the author makes much ado of the politics and conflict at JPL. In some chapters, it gets hard to read through the self-inflating undertone, but it seems fairly obvious that it is the author himself who is the cause of much of the conflict. And now that the era of "faster, better, cheaper" space disasters is behind us; it is clear that simple luck played a leading role in Pathfinder's success - a point the author somehow seems grieved to admit.



2. The details of the development of the first Mars rover was interesting and reasonably well done. I was somewhat distracted by the elaboration of JPL politics and personality conflicts. From this author's point of view, JPL sure sounds like an unpleasant place to work. I felt that the personality conflict part of the book was overemphasized and distracted from what a typical reader wants from a book about the Sojourner rover.



3. In Sojourner, Andrew Mishkin does an excellent job of presenting the success of the Pathfinder mission to Mars, as well as the challenges of getting there. The book gives a brief, but thorough, history of robotics at JPL starting with the lunar rovers and working its way up to the creation of Sojourner and its clone Marie Curie. Mishkin has a talent of presenting technical material in a way that is easy to read and understand, yet provides enough of the technical information to excite and inspire engineers-myself included. Anyone with even the slightest interest in engineering robotics will gain much knowledge from this book!
   
   The book also provides insight into NASA's day-to-day operations during the mission. Explaining difficulties of scheduling shifts on Mars time, dealing with communications issues, and even correcting bugs in the system. Praise to Andrew Mishkin for this piece of history.



4. I just finished Andrew Mishkin's booked titled "Sojourner" and I couldn't put it down. Mishkin, a Senior Systems Engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), helped to design, build and operate humanity's first operational MARS rover. The book starts back in the 1960's with a General Motors built rover which was meant for, but not flown on, the Lunar Surveyor missions of that decade. He explains how this machine became the basis for several JPL skunk-works created machines including the one that finally did the job in 1997. The book contains just enough technical information (both hardware and software) to be interesting but not so much as to lose the non-technical reader. There are two added chapters which cover the missions in 2001 and 2004.



5. I just finished Andrew Mishkin's booked titled "Sojourner" and I couldn't put it down. Mishkin, a Senior Systems Engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), helped to design, build and operate humanity's first operational MARS rover. The book starts back in the 1960's with a General Motors built rover which was meant for, but not flown on, the Lunar Surveyor missions of that decade. He explains how this machine became the basis for several JPL skunk-works created machines including the one that finally did the job in 1997. The book contains just enough technical information (both hardware and software) to be interesting but not so much as to lose the non-technical reader. There are two added chapters which cover the missions in 2001 and 2004.

4 comments about Who's in Space 3e.

1. This mighty book is a veritable kaleidoscope of intriguing personalities; all of them with a common legacy - they were all selected at some time as a candidate to fly into space. Many made it, while others didn't for varying reasons, but they are all in here, with individual photographs accompanying each biographical entry. It is a brilliant concept, and extraordinarily handy for spaceflight researchers and biographers such as myself. It is as close to indispensible as any book can be.
   
   The only difficulty for the author in producing such a book lies in the fact that every year, ineluctably, sees a whole new batch of spaceflight candidates selected; the reason why this book has already been revised twice (and let's hope for a fourth revision).
   
   Moreso than any other book, "Who's Who in Space" offers a history of human spaceflight by showcasing the men and women who were and are an integral part of that history, and the author is to be commended for his diligent and ongoing research. Highly recommended in all editions.



2. Who are the people from around the world who have traveled into space? This book will tell you.
   
   In concise, accurate snapshots, we learn not just about the most famous spacefarers like John Glenn, Yuri Gagarin, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, but also the lesser-known - people became the only person to date to fly from their country, those who were selected but never flew - a wide variety of interesting characters. As a reference to the Space Age, it is indispensible and fascinating.



3. The for now (2002) last in a series of 3 books on both flown and unflown astronauts and cosmonauts. Other updated editions are the "International Space Station" edition and the "International Space Year" edition. All books are A4 format and hardcover. Some pages in the middle with color crew-photos and mission-patches.
   The fourth book in the series might include all Chinese cosmonauts which are in training at Starcity since 2002.
   Every astronaut/cosmonaut is presented per nationality and per background ( civilian or mililitary astronauts, etc ... ). Furthermore there's a passport-photo of each space-man or woman.
   What makes it so interesting is that it provides the CV on all the astronauts/cosmonauts, and therefore anyone who has any desire to become an astronaut/cosmonaut can form an idea which studies are required. A great refernece and a must-have book for space-buffs !



4. Who's who in space is an excellent biographic reference for readers interested in the background of Astronauts, Cosmonauts and Spationautes alike. This book groups all Astro- Cosmonauts by nationality ( US + Russian + international = ESA + CNES + ... ) and then divides them down into Military and Civilian categories. Each book ( there're 3 editions ) is A4 format, hardcover. Later edition(s) might include Chinese cosmonauts which are training at Starcity-Moscow since 2002.
   Each Astronaut and Cosmonaut is represented by his or her Official Individual portrait together with a short biography and a listing of the flown missions What makes it so interesting is that it provides the CV on all the astronauts/cosmonauts, and therefore anyone who has any desire to become an astronaut/cosmonaut can form an idea which studies are required.... Great book as it also has sections on Astronaut group selection and Crewphotos and emblems of the most important US and Russian space missions ...
   Book is used by some SpaceCollectors to get it signed by those who're listed inside ! A must-have for space-buffs !

5 comments about Apollo EECOM: Journey of a Lifetime (Apogee Books Space Series).

1. The chapters about his direct involvement in Apollo as EECOM were fascinating. He accomplished his goal of adding to the historical record from his perspective. Liebergot actually had several critical moments related to Apollo 13. From memory: The failed simulation that started the concept of the LEM as a lifeboat, the cryo stir, the first recognition of there being a problem, his repeated rebuffment of seemingly ridiculous recommendations from a specific controller, and the critical decision to shut down the fuel cells and the realization that brought to others.
   
   I found his writing style to be grittier (that is a positive comment), highlighted by the italicized side comments. I found this to be intriguing especially since he then retrospectively judged the key moments in his life. This would be similar to a person's writing in a journal to help them make sense of the world. I also took the opportunity to read Gene Kranz's book after I read Apollo EECOM and found that book to be an excellent companion and contrast. First, he is also talking about same events from within the same room, just with a different perspective. He also writes (I am sure with his coauthor's assistance), in a grammatically technical writer's way. I liked both writing styles (Liebergot's and Kranz's) very much. He also brings in Sy's involvements, again from his perspective, which dovetails nicely with the recollections in this book. Not that it was needed, it also validates Sy's version of the time. The fact that Kranz mentioned the song included on the CD-ROM made me chuckle (and I hope he gets to hear it again to make him cringe).
   
   The sequence of his life's story is a fascinating portrayal of excelling in the face of adversity. He and his siblings had a horrible family life compounded by the economics of the times. I suspect it was the resultant aversion that pushed him all the way to California away from family and onto a path that lead to his involvement with one of the greatest endeavors man has achieved so far. While he may not be happy with individual moments in his life, as a sum, possibly with the help of the book, I believe he realizes that it has been a good life. The zenith of the human experience is when man takes tragedy and is able to look past it to convert it into something positive and fulfilling. That is the essence of Sy Liebergot's life. He chose to rise above his predicament. There are many, many people who would do well to learn from his example. In looking at his life and story, I am reminded of another book and movie, namely "Rocket Boys"/"October Sky". The difference is the extreme dysfunctionality of his home life and degree of poverty.
   
   Equally fascinating was the accompanying CD-ROM with Mission Control voice loops from the Apollo 13 explosion timeframe. These alone would justify an interested person's purchase of the book. First, I related to the working of the problem. I get very ill, very complicated patients in my emergency department. The underlying problem is unknown. I start taking a series of actions lead by priorities and try to gain more information to better define the problem altering actions as the situation evolves. This can take anywhere from one to three hours. Sometimes the patients don't make it. Most of the time I get them stabilized and out of the department. It was this same process that I "witnessed" through the voice loops. The other perspective was that of the actual time of the unfolding crisis. Other writings, and the movie, give the impression that it was a very short time (15 minutes or so) before the lifesaving critical move to the LEM. The voice loops show that it was well over an hour.
   
   Even though the Apollo program was 30 plus years ago, the fact that we haven't even gone back continues the weight of its accomplishments. I feel that the loss of continuity and the perspective of history and experience will severely impact the strides that we have yet to make. Works such as this one should be mandatory reading for our future space pioneers so that they will gain that needed perspective. Hopefully, it won't take an Armageddon level event to spawn the next great space engineering race.



2. If you want to know exactly how it felt to be in mission control during the Apollo 13 mission, this is the book to get. The CD ROM has the actual recording of the mission control audio loop, just before the Apollo 13 explosion, and several hours of recording after. You can hear how fast the controllers summed up the state of the spacecraft, and how they quickly sorted through their narrowing options.
   
   Sy provides history as to how he became a flight controller, and how his fellow controllers lived during the Apollo program days.
   
   If you want to know what it's like to get to and be inside mission control, and actually hear what the mission control audio loops sounds like, this is a must-get book and CD package.



3. This book is a little short (200 pages) and Sy spends almost a third of that on his troubled childhood. But is a worthwhile read for someone interested in Apollo Era NASA. Sy gives a more low level view of the operation than we have gotten from the many astronaut biographies and flight director biographies (Kraft and Kranz). I enjoyed the "extra's" that he included on the CD, particularly a humorous song from a post-Apollo 13 roast. I would not make it the first book I read about the moon program, but it is a nice collection to my NASA book collection.



4. In a subject that has been charted from boundless angles in thousands of chronicles, Sy's memoir emerges as a truly brilliant account of his role in perhaps one of the most significant endeavors of humankind. Sy's book is much-much more than simply a personal account of his life and role in the space program, it is an extremely well written and compulsively honest tour de force of this history. He teaches us that the story of Apollo was not wholly isolated to the confines of the spacecraft, and that many of the real mavericks worked quietly behind complex consoles inside Mission Control, solving some of the most intricate and sometimes life threatening problems that these men faced in our quest to explore the moon.
   
   Sy's book is in my opinion is a sobering and paramount account of the early manned space flight program from an important and vital perspective. It is a true archive of history that is told not only through narrative, illustrations, and photographs; but rather a historical archive containing audio (which is included on a wonderful CD-ROM), personal artifacts, and technical examples (brilliant panel displays) that bring this history to life. Having spent decades reading every account I can get my hands on, I can safely state that Sy's memoir will remain a solid bookend to one of America's greatest chapters in history.



5. This book isn't one of those thick, literary historical tomes that we have seen a good many of in the last few years from former NASA managers. Rather, this feels like you have been personally invited into Sy's living room to sit on the sofa and look over his memorabilia while he tells you about it over your shoulder. It's a surprisingly frank and honest look at his life. Rather than trying to build himself up to be an historical figure, he pulls no punches with an account of a difficult, scrappy early life where he had to learn to survive his family, then work out how to leave and make something of himself. He tells this compelling story so well that I would have read it even if he had not gone on to join NASA - something I also felt when reading Scott Carpenter's account of his difficult upbringing in his recent memoir. When Liebergot moves on to his years at NASA, we get a refreshingly different account of how things worked there. Most other books on this era have been written by those in the upper echelons of management, but Liebergot here shows us what it was like for the footsoldier in the trenches, with a few little accounts of tempers lost in mission control and other disagreements that the official histories try and gloss over. Rather than do this as a tell-all, Liebergot includes his own failings in the mix - he doesn't hide the fact that he is now on his third marriage, nor the reasons. Liebergot was there for some of NASA's finest undertakings, and this book tells you what it was like from a human perspective - the weariness, the shortcomings, the oversights - that round out the picture very well.

   In short, this is not a polished history of NASA at its finest hour. Rather it is a very loose, informal journey through one man's difficult life, and how he managed to wash up in the right place at the right time.

2 comments about Inside the Space Race: A Space Surgeon's Diary.

1. This book looks at the early days of the American space program from the point of view of a key scientist, someone who had a voice in deciding who would, or would not, be traveling into space.
   
   In the early 1950s, there was much concern, even paranoia, about Soviet military capabilities. The concern got even worse when Sputnik was launched in 1957. Lamb was an Air Force cardiologist who was given the task of developing the cardiology portion of the physical exam used on participants in the Man in Space program. Starting from scratch (a couple of abandoned buildings at Brooks AFB in Texas), Lamb and his group knew that they had to be as sure as possible about a pilot's physical condition. Lamb did not have the final word as to who would be going into space, but his recommendation carried a lot of weight.
   
   When he recommended that Donald "Deke" Slayton, one of the original Mercury astronauts, not be cleared for spaceflight, many important people were not happy. Attempts were made to find cardiologists who would publicly state that Slayton's heart arrythmia should not ground him. Other attempts were made to take the whole cardiology program away from Lamb and his group, and put it under the direct control of NASA or the Pentagon. Lamb strongly objected when he discovered that Slayton was to be the backup astronaut for John Glenn's orbital flight (which almost never happened and which almost ended in disaster), and when Slayton was to be the astronaut for the second orbital flight.
   
   When the emphasis turned to longer flights, Lamb talks about the experiments that were devised to measure the effects of prolonged weightlessness on the human body. Data from Russian flights showed that the human body simply could not take any more than several days of weightlessness. Until methods were found to ease the effects on the body, going to the moon (or anywhere else, for that matter) was not a sure thing.
   
   This is a very interesting inside look at a famous part of American history. It is first-rate, and is recommended for readers of all ages.



2. Our author, Dr. Lawrence E. Lamb is certainly one who has all the qualifications to write a book on this subject and leave you assured the information is correct and informative. A former national syndicated columnist, Dr.Lamb was a key scientist for our nation's man-in-space program and he also developed the medical examinations used to select the astronauts and others going to the moon. Quite a responsibility and one well done.
   As with all threads of history, there are always interesting behind the scene stories in given situations and this one is gripping as we learn how our government dealt with the Soviets' surprise launching of Sputnik and the following years of the space race. You will read of President Kennedy and the role he played however what I found most interesting was the 'up to the plate and hitting a home run' attitude and perseverance that Lyndon Johnson had in this entire race. I never realized the important role he played and I enjoyed the human side portrayed of him.
   Inside the Space Race is an up-front look into a pinnacle time of history in our country, its people and events written in an informative, captivating way. As you close the cover you will realize you have gained a far greater understanding of the importance the space race is to our national security and you will be thankful for the strides forward we are continuing to make. You will appreciate the key players, the roles they took and the sacrifices they made. A very well written, informative read awaits you in this work by Dr. Lamb. Recommended.

2 comments about DIARY OF A COSMONAUT: 211 DAYS IN SPACE (Air and Space, No 4).

1. This is a fascinating and "from the hip" book about what its like to be in a flying tin can for more than half a year. The author gives candid, personal "real-life" views directly from his diary in this very profound book. Within 30 years, humans will be soaring to Mars...from this cosmonaut's frankness we will learn much about the psychology of detachment and coping, leading the way to a better and brighter future for all humankind in space. Highly recommended reading to anyone and everyone!



2. This book provides an honest and in depth look into the montony and uselessness of space flight. Written by Russian cosmonaut Valentin Lebedev, the book is comprised of labored and slow moving text which often confuses and loses the reader. Laiden with many pages of technical jargon and unrelated facts, Lebedev's work is most uninteresting and proves to be a tiresome and tedious novel. Written in the format of a diary, the book does contain many personal and candid passages about Lebedev's experience in space; however, Lebedev's openess only serves to show the frivolessness of his long stint aboard the Solyut space station. In the end, the book's most exciting text proves to be Lebedev's diparture from space. The book portrays the wastefulness and uselessness of maintaining a space program of any sort and I would not reccomend reading its pages to my worst enemy.

1 comments about In Their Own Words: Conversations With the Astronauts and Men Who Led America's Journey into Space and to the Moon.

1. Compiled and edited by Scott Sacknoff (President of the International Space Business Council), In Their Own Words: Conversations With The Astronauts And Men Who Led America's Journey Into Space by is a unique collection of candid interviews with astronauts offering the reader behind-the-scenes glimpses into the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs; as well as a discussion by Walter Cronkite and colleagues about how the media covered historic achievements in space travel; and a great deal more. In Their Own Words is commended to the attention of aerospace enthusiasts and scholars as an engaging, primary source on the history of man's efforts to stretch beyond the boundaries of the Earth itself.

5 comments about I Touch the Future.

1. this book was excellent. informing readers of the tragedy of that cold day in January in 1986 when Space Shuttle Challenger exploded killing all 7 on board. for me, it taught me a lot about the disaster and the months leading up to it. i was born in 1986, 9 months after the explosion and until recently, i had no knowledge of it. then i heard that the first teacher to go into orbit was on that flight and she had 2 kids and a husband, it prompted me to read this book. at first glance, i thought, ok, they're going to tell me that she won a contest, she did some training, and she went up in the shuttle. but the author went in depth so much more and explained the hardships the children faced, after learning their mother would be gone for months at a time. and he explained the exhausting life Christa McAuliffe lived prior to lift-off. I reccommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good and fact-filled book now and then. and for those of you who witnessed the explosion 14 years ago, that should make this book all the more important to you. email me comments or suggestions: rogcha_22@hotmail.com



2. Having experienced the disaster as a middle school student, I have only just begun to research Christa and her glorious rise as an educational icon. As someone who aspires both to be an astronaut and a teacher, I wept at the epilogue. Simply put, Christa was far from normal and average--she worked herself very hard and never seemed to complain.

   Hohler did her justice in this chronicle of Christa's final field trip. It should be required reading of all students who wish to make something of their lives.




3. In the book" I Touch the Future..The Story of Christa McAuliffe"we the readers get to have a closer look at the Challenger tragedy and see just what a tragedy it truly was. Anyone who saw the disaster as it happened probably already had developed an interest in Christa McAuliffe because she was an ordinairy person doing something most of us will never do,and mourned her death.But for those of us who are to young to remember the explosion and the loss of the Challenger crew,( I was only about three years old when it happened) we have to rely on books and old news segments to tell us about this tragedy, and I would have to recommend this book to anyone who is interested in Challenger and Christa McAuliffe. Robert T. Hohler shows the reader all about Christa's training ,homelife and also a clearer view about what her crewmates were like, something we know almost nothing about. I only wish the author could've wrote the biographies of all of Challenger's passengers as well.Read this book so you won't be like me: Not knowing anything about such an important part of history until it's victims had been dead for a decade.



4. This book by Robert Hohler is a well-written, very personal look at the life of a very special woman whom most of us only had a chance to know from a distance. From her childhood to the last few days of her life, Christa McAuliffe was constantly giving gifts of love, insight, advice, friendship and understanding to her family, friends, and students, and the last few months of her life to the rest of the world as well. I Touch The Future gives us all a chance to realize what a huge loss we were dealt on January 28, 1996. If only someone would write equally good biographies of the rest of the Challenger astronauts, we could all realize the full extent of this tragedy.



5. This book is one of many that have touched the hearts of millions with the life of a historical role model. From the day of her birth to the day of the fatal teacher-in-space flight, this book shows the climaxes and downfalls of Christa McAuliffe's wonderful life. We find that through tough childhoods, even the most ordinary person can turn into the most respected role model in the nation. I suggest reading this book if you were at all inspired or touched by the 1986 space shuttle tragedy. You will always remember her touching moments as a child, her fantasitic teaching career for the future of many kids, and her sad ending of her young life. Please read this book as a motion of kindness and rememberance for this wonderful role model for thousands.