How We Got to the Moon: The People, Technology, and Daring Feats of Science Behind Humanity’s Greatest Adventure by John Rocco (review)

This ambitious overview of America’s moon landing project, from President Kennedy’s goal setting though the safe arrival of the Apollo 11 crew back on Earth, delivers over two hundred pages of awe, complete with a dense gallery of illustration (many renderings based closely on extant photos). Coverage comprises science (physics of rocketry, mathematics of orbit plotting, etc.), engineering (projects dispersed among myriad manufacturers), biographies (longer insets, shorter thumbnails), reader experiments (demoing, for example, how sloshing liquid fuel is managed by baffles), and a narrative glue that holds the topics lightly together. Organization seems straightforward and chronological, but as the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions proceed, component projects overlap, and few dates are included to help readers track the timelines of developments; it’s frequently unclear whether systems and innovations under discussion apply to any lunar mission, the Apollo mission, or the Apollo 11 flight specifically. Sometimes Rocco gets it exactly right—such as his clearly disambiguated description of the Super Guppy cargo plane—and readers looking for fresh material to support their space enthusiasm will wish for more of the same. This title, however, should prove more satisfying to middle school browsers thumbing for some wow moments. End matter includes a list of Apollo piloted missions, a note on research, sources lists, interview citations, lists for youth reading, a list of acronyms, and an index.