Bold They Rise

The Space Shuttle Early Years, 1972-1986

By: David Hitt, Heather R. Smith

Narrated by: Gary L Willprecht

After the Apollo program put 12 men on the moon and safely brought them home, anything seemed possible. In this spirit, the team at NASA set about developing the space shuttle, arguably the most complex piece of machinery ever created. The world's first reusable spacecraft, it launched like a rocket, landed like a glider, and carried out complicated missions in between. Bold They Rise tells the story of the space shuttle through the personal experiences of the astronauts, engineers, and scientists who made it happen - in space and on the ground, from the days of research and design through the heroic accomplishments of the program to the tragic last minutes of the Challenger disaster. In the participants' own voices, we learn what so few are privy to: what it was like to create a new form of spacecraft, to risk one's life testing that craft, to float freely in the vacuum of space as a one-man satellite, to witness a friend's death. A "guided tour" of the shuttle - in historical, scientific, and personal terms - this book provides a fascinating, richly informed, and deeply personal view of a feat without parallel in the human story.

©2014 Board of Regents of the University of Nebraska (P)2017 Redwood Audiobooks

Not great

After listening to Apollo, I was really excited about this…but the narration is almost intolerable and to be honest, the story was pretty boring. Take it with a grain of salt.

To boldly go…

I’m glad I decided to read this book. I enjoyed hearing the stories from the astronauts and people involved in the program’s early days. As a kid I would follow the shuttle missions. This book is a great follow on read to Into The Black about the development of the shuttle and the first flight of Columbia. I’m reading “truth lies and o-rings “ next then onto “Wheels Stop” to cover the rest of the shuttle program

good

would have preferred a more technical explanation of designing the shuttle. most of the book focused on the missions.

A slightly different perspective

I wasn’t super into the performance, mainly because he was using different voices for people like they were characters in a story, and I feel like a guy trying to imitate Sally Ride just isn’t necessary. Read me the book, and the words will carry the weight of the moment.

That being said; I’ve read at 7 different books about the Challenger mishap, and there was some interviews in this book that I had not heard before. So, if you are here for that type of thing; recommend.

The first years of the shuttle in a nice format

Any additional comments?

I have received a copy of this book in audio format by the narrator in exchange for an honest review.

This book narrates the first years of the Space Shuttle program from the point of view of the astronauts.

The program was launched by Nixon wanting to have a different approach to traveling to space, more on a budget and with reusable space crafts. One of the program's goals was to have quite an amount of missions per year, which would reduce the per-mission cost. In the end this cost was not reduced as much as it was expected due to parts that could not be reused. Primarily the space shuttle missions were related to satellite launching and investigation in zero G, but then the intention was making it accessible to people not related to the program. The last part of the book is dedicated to the Challenger, what caused the accident, and how this changed the vision of the shuttle program. The missions were maybe overlooked and lightly taken, and from then onwards things needed to be taken more strictly to avoid future disasters. The story continues in 'Wheels Stop: The Tragedies and Triumphs of the Space Shuttle Program, 1986-2011', which also promises to be an interesting read.

This is quite a long book, over thirteen hours, but it is really amazing. I knew about the shuttle program but I ignored some of the historical details. Here they are all compiled in a nice format that will delight everybody. The book is full of anecdotes told by the astronauts and technicians. There is a little of tech babble but not too much, making it accessible to everybody. I think it would be useful to take a look at some pictures during the technical descriptions, just to have an idea about what goes where, but it is not strictly necessary.

Gary L. Willprecht made an amazing job narrating this book, slightly changing voices when delivering someone's speech. It was like watching a documentary, and despite the great length of the book and the hundreds of details, Willprecht was able to hold my attention from beginning to end.

This book was a great listen, and I would recommend it to anyone who is a bit curious about NASA and their projects. I will definitely want to listen to other books of this series.