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adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This book. THIS BOOK. I am shattered and in awe.
I'm writing this post minutes after finishing Atmosphere, and the tears are still drying on my face. This book held me in its grip from its opening pages—it starts with a bang—and it has been such a struggle to put it down each night and go to sleep, to start work in the morning instead of reaching for it. This morning, so close to the end, I put off my editing so I could cry my way to the end.
Light spoilers for the beginning of the book below, because there's no way to avoid it:
The way TJR structured this book is perfect and brilliant and so freaking mean. It opens with a disaster in space, and by the end of the first few chapters, multiple characters are dead. And then we go back four years to the start of their astronaut training, and we spend 327 pages falling in love with all of them. We see their friendships and loves and families and personal growth. And each new beautiful development in the past sections feels like a punch in the gut because of what we know happens in the present timeline.
This book is a queer love story set in the 1980s, so it explores a lot of elements of that relationship and its context, but it's also a love story about Joan and her niece Frances, and the way TJR portrayed that relationship was so gorgeous and tender. I love Frances so freaking much. I loved all of them and all of it.
This book will make you cry. And everyone should go read it right now. 10000/10. Just perfection.
I'm writing this post minutes after finishing Atmosphere, and the tears are still drying on my face. This book held me in its grip from its opening pages—it starts with a bang—and it has been such a struggle to put it down each night and go to sleep, to start work in the morning instead of reaching for it. This morning, so close to the end, I put off my editing so I could cry my way to the end.
Light spoilers for the beginning of the book below, because there's no way to avoid it:
The way TJR structured this book is perfect and brilliant and so freaking mean. It opens with a disaster in space, and by the end of the first few chapters, multiple characters are dead. And then we go back four years to the start of their astronaut training, and we spend 327 pages falling in love with all of them. We see their friendships and loves and families and personal growth. And each new beautiful development in the past sections feels like a punch in the gut because of what we know happens in the present timeline.
This book is a queer love story set in the 1980s, so it explores a lot of elements of that relationship and its context, but it's also a love story about Joan and her niece Frances, and the way TJR portrayed that relationship was so gorgeous and tender. I love Frances so freaking much. I loved all of them and all of it.
This book will make you cry. And everyone should go read it right now. 10000/10. Just perfection.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Abandonment
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Abandonment
Minor: Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Vomit, Grief, Gaslighting
hopeful
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
The beautiful (& horrible) thing about reading is that sometimes, you feel as though you’ve been irrevocably changed in the middle of a Tuesday afternoon & materially, nothing has happened.
This might be my favorite book of Taylor’s. I sobbed twice & cried less intensely countless times.
I think the subtitle really says it all, this is, to its very core, a love story. There were times I doubted it but clung to that subtitle with the hope that Taylor knew that love stories generally require happy endings. I think she pulled this one off more successfully than some of her other novels.
Joan & Vanessa, & even Barbara & the other astronauts, feel like lived in characters, they’re real people. & I love them for that. There are so many feelings & emotions in this book that I know. Taylor is a master at capturing the human experience. I also loved the things I couldn’t relate to, I loved that Joan ended up hating being in space. It felt right in a way I can’t explain.
The scene after Barbara’s wedding made me want to throw up. I couldn’t stop thinking about how Vanessa & Joan would be in their 60s or 70s when marriage equality was enacted nationwide. About how I was lucky enough to be born in a time where I got to see that when I was young enough that I wasn’t spending my whole life waiting.
I loved all of Joan’s meditations on humanity & life & god. & I loved Vanessa’s responses.
The gut punch of realization when the timeline clicked was almost too much for me. I had to go back & listen to the opening again.
I wish I had more. I know I almost always ask this of my five star reads but I do want more. I would have been satisfied with a single chapter epilogue, a glimpse what life as a family would have looked like for Joan, Francis, & Vanessa.
This might be my favorite book of Taylor’s. I sobbed twice & cried less intensely countless times.
I think the subtitle really says it all, this is, to its very core, a love story. There were times I doubted it but clung to that subtitle with the hope that Taylor knew that love stories generally require happy endings. I think she pulled this one off more successfully than some of her other novels.
Joan & Vanessa, & even Barbara & the other astronauts, feel like lived in characters, they’re real people. & I love them for that. There are so many feelings & emotions in this book that I know. Taylor is a master at capturing the human experience. I also loved the things I couldn’t relate to, I loved that Joan ended up hating being in space. It felt right in a way I can’t explain.
The scene after Barbara’s wedding made me want to throw up. I couldn’t stop thinking about how Vanessa & Joan would be in their 60s or 70s when marriage equality was enacted nationwide. About how I was lucky enough to be born in a time where I got to see that when I was young enough that I wasn’t spending my whole life waiting.
I loved all of Joan’s meditations on humanity & life & god. & I loved Vanessa’s responses.
The gut punch of realization when the timeline clicked was almost too much for me. I had to go back & listen to the opening again.
I wish I had more. I know I almost always ask this of my five star reads but I do want more. I would have been satisfied with a single chapter epilogue, a glimpse what life as a family would have looked like for Joan, Francis, & Vanessa.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Abandonment
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
3 things I hope happen after this book:
1. That Joann and Vaness live a peaceful and beautiful life together with Frances and are happy forever 🥰
2. That a love like this finds me in this lifetime 🥰
3. That the selfish c*nt Barbara rots in hell 🥰
1. That Joann and Vaness live a peaceful and beautiful life together with Frances and are happy forever 🥰
2. That a love like this finds me in this lifetime 🥰
3. That the selfish c*nt Barbara rots in hell 🥰
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body shaming, Bullying, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Minor: Lesbophobia
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Lesbophobia, Abandonment
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
It is the early 80s. Joan, an astronomer and astrophysicist professor and Vanessa, an aeronautical engineer, both in their thirties, meet and fall in love trying to become one of the first female American astronauts. It's a time full of wonder for space travel, stars and new worlds but also a time where homosexuality was forbidden so liaisons had to be conducted in private because some people thought gays were evil and couldn't be let near children. Joan's tender love for her niece Frances debunks all that thoroughly of course.
I got this book on the strength of the author's name, without knowing anything about the story. I had equally loved Daisy Jones and the Six and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, but this must be her best yet. Why else would I read a book about fictional female astronauts in the NASA space shuttle programme in the early to mid eighties and be utterly absorbed, even though I haven't got a clue about the terminology that's freely banded about?
There are two timelines, the one spanning the years in the NASA training programme, and the one day in December 1984 when tragedy strikes, and the start of which opens the book. While you're reading the space rescue story you don't want it to pause and when it switches to the love story, that soft, swooning romance, you don't want it to end either. And that is the mark of a great storyteller. I loved all the characters, Griff, Hank, Donna, Frances, even Lydia. Ok, maybe not Barbara and Daniel, they were awful parents.
I loved the short chapters that made it impossible for me to stop reading. I was rooting for Joan and Vanessa from the beginning, and there was always an undercurrent of tension - will they get the life they want? And that ending, oh my God, it nearly broke me. I ended up in floods of tears at 3am. This has to become a movie. If I could have given six stars, I would. Such an emotional story so beautifully told, about our passions and our place in the world - to find where we can belong. Bravo. Read if you love Hidden Figures and Apollo 13, coupled with found family and lesbians.
I got this book on the strength of the author's name, without knowing anything about the story. I had equally loved Daisy Jones and the Six and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, but this must be her best yet. Why else would I read a book about fictional female astronauts in the NASA space shuttle programme in the early to mid eighties and be utterly absorbed, even though I haven't got a clue about the terminology that's freely banded about?
There are two timelines, the one spanning the years in the NASA training programme, and the one day in December 1984 when tragedy strikes, and the start of which opens the book. While you're reading the space rescue story you don't want it to pause and when it switches to the love story, that soft, swooning romance, you don't want it to end either. And that is the mark of a great storyteller. I loved all the characters, Griff, Hank, Donna, Frances, even Lydia. Ok, maybe not Barbara and Daniel, they were awful parents.
I loved the short chapters that made it impossible for me to stop reading. I was rooting for Joan and Vanessa from the beginning, and there was always an undercurrent of tension - will they get the life they want? And that ending, oh my God, it nearly broke me. I ended up in floods of tears at 3am. This has to become a movie. If I could have given six stars, I would. Such an emotional story so beautifully told, about our passions and our place in the world - to find where we can belong. Bravo. Read if you love Hidden Figures and Apollo 13, coupled with found family and lesbians.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, Vomit, Grief, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Abandonment
adventurous
emotional
inspiring
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexism, Lesbophobia
adventurous
emotional
inspiring
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Homophobia, Sexism, Grief, Lesbophobia
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Homophobia, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Grief
Moderate: Bullying, Medical content, Lesbophobia, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Sexual content