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600 pages of the Apollo missions as experienced by the astronauts. There's almost no engineering, politics, etc. But the stories are very readable, and you'll learn the differences between Apollos 12-17."How could the most futuristic thing humans have ever done be so far in the past?"
This is an incredible look at the entire Apollo mission, not just the "popular" flights (1, 8, 11, 13). I really loved getting to know each of the Apollo astronauts and learning more about what each flight involved and accomplished..This is probably too much for a beginner in space history, but is perfect for those of us who can't read enough books about the space race!.I listened to the audio, wonderfully narrated by Bronson Pinchot. I got A LOT of cleaning/organizing done while listening to th...
A good but in my mind slightly too long account of the Apollo Program.The usual suspects (Apollo 8, 11 and 13) are covered in detail. As is the tragedy of Apollo 1. But Chaikin also gives a lot of room to the Apollo 12 and 14-17 missions. The third part of the book mostly being about Lunar geology.While I appreciate his approach, it unfortunately does evoke some of the same feelings the public had about the Apollo Program back in the 60s and 70s. Seeing our home planet for the first time surely
This is the "go to" book for nearly all things related to the Apollo Program for the average person interested in one of the greatest achievements of human history and the faces that made the trip. If you can only afford one book about Apollo, this is it. One reviewer seems to think that there may not be enough actual "political background" and "engineering" involved with this account. I read aviation and engineering books more often than not and this is not a book on the in depth engineering in...
This was a longer audiobook project than I'd figured on, but the lack of commute time while working from home the past two months will do that. And I didn't figure out for some time that there were available listening pockets after all, though that has depended on the weather. The Apollo astronauts make good company on long walks. They all come from a bygone era of American innovation and ambition, and it's easy to feel stirred by the sheer accomplishment gathered in one talent pool. Buzz Aldrin...
I read this book probably when it first came out in paper back, which is about 25 years ago at this point. The only part I could remember, I'm embarrassed to admit, was the brief sentence about Pete Conrad being so anonymous in the astronaut program that he was able to stand out on his front lawn scratching his balls without being noticed.Thankfully this behemoth of a book was much more than what I remembered! A lot of the focus, especially in the later chapters, was on geology, which made me re...
Revisited upon watching PBS' "Chasing The Moon" at the 50th anniversary of the moon landing.Tells the story of the lucky few who have walked on the moon in a way that humanizes the characters and dramatizes (perhaps melodramatizes) the events. Certainly a worthy successor to Tom Wolfe's The Right Stuff although this one is often more reserved and less exuberant. But by focusing on the players, the most significant feat of engineering in history is seamlessly folded into a quiet, moving human dra...
Very thorough history of the Apollo moon-landing. Chaikin is obviously very passionate about the subject-matter and his prose is pleasing to read. If you have ever wanted to know what the birth of NASA and the subsequent Apollo program is all about, I think you'd be hard pressed to do better than this book.
I got this for Christmas and it was all I could do not to sit sit down and read the whole thing from cover to cover, enormous though it is. I’ve been a space nut since I was very small (wait, I am still very small) and this book is just a joy. It describes NASA’s Apollo program in great detail, going through each mission from the disastrous beginnings through to the six Moon landings. While sometimes bogged down by technical language and military customs, it does a great job of explaining how it...
I am not a believer in the conspiracy theory of the moon landings. There were just too many people involved, and that many people simply can't be counted upon to keep their mouths shut for all these years.Perhaps I am a little biased, though. As an expatriate Yankee, one who is shamed and saddened by much of what my country has done, the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo missions are one of the few things my country did in the Twentieth Century (and so far in the Twenty-First) for which I am actually p...
A Great bookA book that goes very deep into the astronauts' experiences. The focus is on the astronauts and on the Apollo flights. There's not much information about the previous Gemini or Mercury programs and even the progress of Apollo program is only lightly covered between Apollo 1 and 8. There are plenty of technical jargon and talk about things like mascons and breccias but it's only through the pilots and flights why they're covered. Major players of ground crew get some exposure but one
The book that was used by Ron Howard, et al to make the Apollo 13 movie! I got this book as part of a space-themed Humble Audiobook Bundle. As I was choosing the next audiobook I'd listen to whenever I ran out of podcast, I decided to go for non-fiction book. And so I started my journey through a couple decades of NASA history. Once things get going (ie the men are on their way to the moon), Chaikin does an excellent job of switching POVs throughout the mission to give us some insight into each
The Apollo project was the culmination of the Soviet-American space race, the magnificently mad endeavor with no purpose other than national prestige, a twentieth century equivalent of the Great Sphinx of Giza. The Soviets were the first to orbit a satellite around the Earth, to orbit a man, and to land a probe on the Moon, Venus and Mars. Yet the Americans landed a man on the Moon, which the Soviets tried and failed to do. The project used machines more complicated than a Yamato class battleshi...
Dude, totally amazing. Okay, so, I've owned this book for at least five years now and I kept putting off reading it because I've read a bunch of books about NASA before and also because...I mean, it's really big. When's the last time you read a nonfiction book that is 720 pages long?!? Holy shit! I mainly read YA and graphic novels these days, so it was kind of intimidating. But anyway, I think there was recently some deal where I got it for $5 on audible and I figured I'd put it off long enough...
A thrilling book,a great adventure. Andrew Chaikin brings the astronauts to life. What is essentially a dry subject,becomes first rate entertainment.The story of each moon mission is described in vivid detail.Lots of dramatic moments,the first view of the earth from lunar orbit,(Apollo 8),the selection of the first man to step on the moon (Apollo 11),the moment of near disaster for Apollo 12,the near catastrophic crisis aboard Apollo 13,and the landing of the last man on the moon (Apollo 17).Apo...
I have this memory, I think it was Apollo 16 back in April of 1972. The television coverage had just closed for the day and I went to the back porch of our house and looked up at the sky. It was still daylight but the moon was out and I stared with wonder and thought to myself that there were actually people up there at that very moment. I was eight years old. That is my most vivid memory of the Apollo program. I was five when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin first walked on the moon. I have no me...
As a young boy in the mid-1960’s I was fascinated with the space program. My father would make sure not to miss any of the live broadcasts of the manned launches (which seemed to always be impossibly early in the morning), and I insisted that he wake me in time to see them also. The excitement that I felt then, as I imagined myself seated inside the tiny capsule at the top of a huge and powerful rocket, still reverberates in me today when I think back on it.I was 10 years old when Neil Armstrong...
This is the true story of what was – arguably – the greatest technological and engineering achievement of the twentieth century. (No less a commentator that Arthur C. Clarke said that the moon landings will be the defining moment of our age that will be remembered in a thousand years time!) Anybody that doubts the genuine significance of the moon landings upon our understanding of the formation of the solar system and how the universe works should read this book. If you are one of those people t...
This is not about the scientists, or the engineers, or the thousands of people that made Apollo possible. This book is about the personal lives and inner thoughts of the astronauts. And it is fascinating. Chaikin's book served as the basis for the HBO series From the Earth to the Moon, which I must now watch. We only have a few Apollo astronauts left living. And we have not been back to the moon. Our "president" this week announced that he wanted to privatize the International Space Station, and...