Space Memoir

In the 1940s and '50s, when the newly minted Jet Propulsion Laboratory needed quick-thinking mathematicians to calculate velocities and plot trajectories, they didn't turn to male graduates. Rather, they recruited an elite group of young women who, with only pencil, paper, and mathematical prowess, transformed rocket design, helped bring about the first American satellites, and made the exploration of the solar system possible.

For the larger-than-life personalities now staking their fortunes on the development of rocket ships, the new race to explore space could be a dead end, a lucrative opportunity - or the key to humanity's salvation. Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos take center stage in this fast-paced narrative as they attempt to disrupt the space economy, feed their own egos, and maybe even save the world.

What's it like to travel at more than 850 MPH, riding in a supersonic T-38 twin turbojet engine airplane? What happens when the space station toilet breaks? How do astronauts "take out the trash" on a spacewalk, tightly encapsulated in a space suit with just a few layers of fabric and Kevlar between them and the unforgiving vacuum of outer space?

When Stephen Hawking died, he was widely recognized as the world's best physicist, and even its smartest person. He was neither. In Hawking Hawking, science journalist Charles Seife explores how Stephen Hawking came to be thought of as humanity's greatest genius. Hawking spent his career grappling with deep questions in physics, but his renown didn't rest on his science. He was a master of self-promotion, hosting parties for time travelers, declaring victory over problems he had not solved, and wooing billionaires.

In this insightful, funny, and whip-smart book, acclaimed writer Evette Dionne explores the minefields fat Black women are forced to navigate in the course of everyday life. From her early experiences of harassment to adolescent self-discovery in internet chatrooms to a diagnosis of heart failure at age twenty-nine, Dionne tracks her relationships with friendship, sex, motherhood, agoraphobia, health, pop culture, and self-image.

In 1929, Edwin Hubble announced the greatest discovery in the history of astronomy since Galileo first turned a telescope to the heavens. The galaxies, previously believed to float serenely in the void, are in fact hurtling apart at an incredible speed: the universe is expanding. This stunning discovery was the culmination of a decades-long arc of scientific and technical advancement.

Directing his polemics against the pedantry of his time, Galileo, as his own popularizer, addressed his writings to contemporary laymen. His support of Copernican cosmology, against the Church’s strong opposition, his development of a telescope, and his unorthodox opinions as a philosopher of science were the central concerns of his career and the subjects of four of his most important writings. Drake’s introductory essay place them in their biographical and historical context.

On January 28, 1986, NASA's space shuttle Challenger exploded after blasting off from Cape Canaveral. Christa McAuliffe, America's "Teacher in Space", was instantly killed, along with the other six members of the mission. At least that's what most of us remember. Kevin Cook tells us what really happened on that ill-fated, unforgettable day. He traces the pressures - leading from NASA to the White House - that triggered the fatal order to launch on an ice-cold Florida morning.

Based on his historic mission to the International Space Station, Ask an Astronaut is Tim Peake's guide to life in space and his answers to the thousands of questions he has been asked since his return to Earth. With explanations ranging from the mundane (how do you wash your clothes or go to the bathroom while in orbit?) to the profound (do humans have a duty to explore the unknown?), all written in Tim's characteristically warm style, Tim shares his thoughts on every aspect of space exploration.

Susan Swan has never fit inside the boxes that other people have made for her—the daughter box, the wife box, the mother box, the femininity box. Instead, throughout her richly lived, independent decades, she has carved her own path and lived with the consequences. In this revealing and revelatory memoir, Swan shares the key moments of her life.

As far back as stories go, pioneers have reached for the skies. In the last two hundred years, they have mastered the air and made the modern world possible. Today they are bringing outer space within our reach. They're inventors and toymakers, amateurs and adventurers, visionaries, dreamers and, yes, crackpots....

In October 1968 Donn Eisele flew with fellow astronauts Walt Cunningham and Wally Schirra into Earth orbit in Apollo 7. The first manned mission in the Apollo program and the first manned flight after a fire during a launch pad test killed three astronauts in early 1967, Apollo 7 helped restart NASA's manned-spaceflight program.

Julia Child's 20' x 14' kitchen was a serious workspace and recipe-testing lab that exuded a sense of mid-century homey comfort. Now, it has been on display at the National Museum of American History in Washington, DC, for most of the past twenty years. Between lively narrative and detailed commentary on Julia's favorite kitchen gadgets, Julia Child's Kitchen illuminates the stories behind the room's design, use, significance, and legacy, showing how deeply Julia Child continues to influence food today.

Editor especializado em ciência, Samuel Graydon desafiou-se a encontrar a essência do grande cientista que redefiniu nossa visão do Universo. O resultado é esta biografia-mosaico com 99 histórias que vão da infância à maturidade, com glórias e fracassos, dores e alegrias do homem que virou sinônimo de genialidade.

Kayla Lieberman grew up in the American community of New Brooklyn but has never considered herself American. She is a Martian and proud of it. But when she is recruited into the department of outland security under the auspices of Charlotte Kensett, Kayla is faced with a choice…. Stand with Mars or turn her back on everything she ever knew.

Deborah Santana is best known for her marriage to music icon Carlos Santana - a 30-year bond that endures to this day. But as a girl growing up in San Francisco in the 1960s, daughter of a White mother and a Black father - the legendary blues guitarist Saunders King - her life was charged with its own drama long before she married.

Deborah Santana is best known for her marriage to music icon Carlos Santana, a 30-year bond that endures to this day. But as a girl growing up in San Francisco in the 1960s, daughter of a White mother and a Black father, the legendary blues guitarist Saunders King, her life was charged with its own drama long before she married.

Raised in 1950s South London and Norfolk with a white, working-class family, Esua’s education in racial politics was immediate and personal. From Britain and Scandinavia to Italy and Tanzania, she tackled inequality wherever she saw it, establishing an inspiring legacy in the Women’s lib and Black Power movements.

09.07 am. 12 de abril de 1961. Un cohete de alto secreto en la URSS. Un joven ruso se sienta en una minúscula cápsula encima del misil balístico intercontinental más potente de la Unión Soviética -diseñado originalmente para transportar una cabeza nuclear- y despega hacia el cielo. Se llama Yuri Gagarin. Y está a punto de hacer historia.

By the time she was 18, Caroline Jones had lived in five different African countries as well as Pakistan. Her father worked for the UN, and the family followed him to countries in or on the border of civil wars and famines. It was a childhood full of adventure, but it was also transient and impermanent. At 16 she went to boarding school in England and then on to Oxford University. At 17 Caroline developed bulimia, a disease that became like a lover to her, her map through darkness.