Learn why NASA astronaut Mike Collins calls this extraordinary space
race story "the best book on Apollo" this inspiring and intimate ode to
ingenuity celebrates one of the most daring feats in human history.*
When the alarm went off forty thousand feet above the moon's surface,
both astronauts looked down at the computer to see 1202 flashing on the
readout. Neither of them knew what it meant, and time was running out .
. .*
On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans
to walk on the moon. One of the world's greatest technological
achievements -- and a triumph of the American spirit -- the Apollo 11
mission was a mammoth undertaking involving more than 410,000 men and
women dedicated to winning the space race against the Soviets.
Set amid the tensions and upheaval of the sixties and the Cold War,
Shoot for the Moon is a gripping account of the dangers, the
challenges, and the sheer determination that defined not only Apollo 11,
but also the Mercury and Gemini missions that came before it. From the
shock of Sputnik and the heart-stopping final minutes of John Glenn's
Mercury flight to the deadly whirligig of Gemini 8, the doomed Apollo 1
mission, and that perilous landing on the Sea of Tranquility -- when the
entire world held its breath while Armstrong and Aldrin battled computer
alarms, low fuel, and other problems -- James Donovan tells the whole
story.
Both sweeping and intimate, Shoot for the Moon is "a powerfully
written and irresistible celebration" of one of humankind's most
extraordinary accomplishments (Booklist, starred review).
