Riding Rockets

Here's my review of Riding Rockets: The Outrageous Tales of a Space Shuttle Astronaut, by Mike Mullane. Spoiler: I liked it!

I'm going to go ahead and give this 5 stars, even though Mullane's favorite thing about himself--his sense of humor--is mostly awful. Still, the man can write, and he does a great job of chronicling how the astronaut's special blend of obsessive competitiveness, huge self-confidence, and gut-churning fear can land him in the back seat of a space craft, wearing a urine condom and praying the weather will clear so he can be blasted skyward even as he counts the various ways he can end up dead in the very near future. Unexpectedly, given the author's insistence that he hails from the Planet AD (Arrested Development), he's also a great champion of the beauties of Earth, which he was able to observe during three Shuttle missions and describes wonderfully in the book. There's much more to enjoy in Riding Rockets, including the barbs Mullane aims at NASA management in general and one bureaucrat in particular, but I won't spoil the fun. This is one of the very best of the astronaut books.