Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by hannahstohelit
Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space by Adam Higginbotham
4.75
I critique a lot of the nonfiction books I read with "I don't get why they put all these things together rather than just picking one and focusing on it" and I can't make that complaint here because this thing felt FLAWLESSLY constructed. I was confused at first as to why all this information was being included at the beginning and by about 3/4 of the way I felt like I understood everything about Higginbotham's choices.
I'd previously read his book about Chernobyl, which I'd enjoyed- but this was better. And the great thing about it is, I knew nothing about the topic. I'd seen Apollo 13 and I had previously been aware of the Challenger explosion as a thing that happened, and was like "yeah there was something about the seals, right?", but it became SO clear that I just knew nothing about astronauts and the space program. I had friends who were space geeks when I was a kid but it so completely passed me by that I thought that "space shuttle" was just a generic term for the vehicles that astronauts used. So not only did this book manage to do a great job introducing me to the topic from its building blocks, it also built a very clear picture in a way that was justified and inexorable.
The quarter point from perfection for me is completely subjective- I am terrible with math/physics as well as with imagining things spatially (which is probably why I'm bad at math/physics), and so a lot of the technical stuff blew right past me and in some cases felt somewhat excessive. But otherwise it was a triumph, with the parallel developments of the space shuttle program itself, the recruitment of that first diverse cohort of astronauts, mutating attitudes toward the space program, etc etc all culminating seamlessly into the two simultaneous stories of the crew getting ready to launch and the engineers worrying about whether it would be safe. And, after 400 pages of jargon and details, I was crying when reading about the impact on the families. This book just did all the different bits of it right.
I'd previously read his book about Chernobyl, which I'd enjoyed- but this was better. And the great thing about it is, I knew nothing about the topic. I'd seen Apollo 13 and I had previously been aware of the Challenger explosion as a thing that happened, and was like "yeah there was something about the seals, right?", but it became SO clear that I just knew nothing about astronauts and the space program. I had friends who were space geeks when I was a kid but it so completely passed me by that I thought that "space shuttle" was just a generic term for the vehicles that astronauts used. So not only did this book manage to do a great job introducing me to the topic from its building blocks, it also built a very clear picture in a way that was justified and inexorable.
The quarter point from perfection for me is completely subjective- I am terrible with math/physics as well as with imagining things spatially (which is probably why I'm bad at math/physics), and so a lot of the technical stuff blew right past me and in some cases felt somewhat excessive. But otherwise it was a triumph, with the parallel developments of the space shuttle program itself, the recruitment of that first diverse cohort of astronauts, mutating attitudes toward the space program, etc etc all culminating seamlessly into the two simultaneous stories of the crew getting ready to launch and the engineers worrying about whether it would be safe. And, after 400 pages of jargon and details, I was crying when reading about the impact on the families. This book just did all the different bits of it right.