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mrericsully 's review for:
I have the goal of reading every astronaut autobiography and eventually every other book by an astronaut. Obviously when tragedy strikes they don't write books, so I have extended that list is to include books by family. At one point in my life I was certain that I wanted to be an astronaut, but along the line I was discouraged by others and by the long odds. Additionally, I had no clue how expansive NASA, but I didn't want to work in close proximity to the astronauts, and didn't consider becoming an engineer. All of this led me to distance myself from following the space program. Still I remember the Columbia disaster- I was in my dorm room and saw a blurb pop-up on a news banner on some website, and so I scrambles downstairs to the arch the news on the TV. At some point I had to leave to go to the cafeteria and get lunch before it closed, and I watched some news there. Later I remember Evelyn and Rick Husband being mentioned in chapel because of their faith. I feel like later when this book came out we even did a short teleconference with her, but I may just be recalling her in interviews. Having said that it could have been her co-author too, because she is an alumni of my college (Cedarville University), and spoke at least one time in chapel and we also watched several video ads for some of her book releases and the horrible The Christmas Shoes Hallmark adaptation of her book. [This is as much because of personal experience with my mother-in-law being diagnosed and later passing from cancer around Christmas ('03 & '10 respectively). The movie and song came out the year she was diagnosed, if I remember correctly, and seemed to come on at the worst times, like heading to an appointment or to the nursing home the morning she passed.] My distance from the program, as well as the tragedy of the whole thing led me to avoid the book for a long while. By the time I was interested in getting around to reading it, I had trouble find a copy in print or on audio. Recently in doing a broad library search for astronaut autobiographies, I managed to find this one and read it as soon as it was available. It was good, but its focus wasn't really on him as an astronaut. His time as an astronaut was there, but the book mostly focuses on family life, their faith, and coping with the tragedy. Very little was said about his missions as an astronaut or the accident itself. Listening to it as an audiobook had both pros and cons. The upside was that actual audio and recordings were used at times, especially President Bush's eulogy and some music. On the other hand, because it was read by the author, Evelyn- his wife, her emotion came through strongly in the most tragic and emotional times of the story and that made it very hard to listen to at times. Overall, it was a good short read, and his faith is inspiring, but I wished it had gotten into more details about his career.