Rocket Men: The Epic Story of the First Men on the Moon [Format Kindle]

I saw in one of the reviews that in 40 years this book will be the book everyone turns to. I hope not, because that means there will be a lot of misinformed people in 40 years.

There are some good things about this book. It is an entertaining read. It provides context to events that is helpful. It also includes stories I hadn't heard before, which is refreshing. The problem is the book is full of errors, some showing a basic lack of understanding of the subject matter. It gets so bad I'm left wondering what in the book I can actually trust.

If you are new to the subject and want a good book to read, I recommend either Chris Kraft's or Gene Cernan's books.

I'll give it two stars since it is an enjoyable read.

Here is some errors I can think of off the top of my head. (I didn't want to put them in my main review.) It's not a complete list:
* Stating Gene Cernan was commander of Apollo 15, instead of 17
* A completely wrong description of what Max-Q is
* Confusing escape velocity and orbital speed.
* Calling the landing radar PGNS (which makes sense, since it is pronounced PINGS, but wrong)
* Stating that Armstrong used the Abort Guidance System to land, since he had to maneuver around some boulders. It wasn't.

That's just a few, and you may ask what the big deal with them is. The problem is that they are so pervasive it destroys the credibility of the author.

This book is entertaining, imaginatively structured, and packed with information. Unfortunately, it's also riddled with errors. Some are just bizarre. On page 194, author Craig Nelson describes the first flight of the Saturn 5 in 1967, and he seems to have fallen into a parallel universe where the mission was a near disaster, instead of the "success on all accounts" described in Roger Bilstein's "Stages of Saturn" (accessible online). Here is what Nelson has to say: "On November 9 at 0700 EST, Apollo 4 launched. Two F-1 rockets abruptly quit during liftoff, at which the stack pulled a U-turn and headed screaming back at the ground. But the guidance system righted the vehicle, and the CM dummy capsule was successfully put into orbit." There are so many things wrong with that passage that it's hard to know where to begin. Suffice it to say that everything about the performance of the rocket is incorrect and could not possibly have happened as described. It shows a basic misunderstanding of the fundamentals of the subject, which Nelson displays over and over. Take his "essential formula for rocketry" on page 96: "combine liquid fuel, oxygen (for added power and to operate in a vacuum), and a flame to trigger an explosion of gases...." There are four errors: the fuel can be, and often is, solid; the oxidizer is not for "added power," it's indispensible for a reaction to occur at all (leaving aside the special case of a monopropellant); some propellants ignite without a flame (for example, in the CM and LM); finally, it's not an explosion. This is not nitpicking; it's rocketry 101. Later in this passage, Nelson calls liquid hydrogen an oxidizer (it's a fuel). Such sloppy writing occurs throughout the book, which obviously was not checked by relevant experts. Still, I think it deserves more than one star. I give it three because Nelson has told a familiar story in a fresh way, and he's assembled a kind of "greatest hits" from Apollo memoirs and oral histories. It's a good read, but let the reader beware!

I have to say, the author CHOSE to write about an event which is intensely tied to technology. It is also a real event in history. If accuracy in the essential technological aspects is not important to Mr. Nelson, as a person writing history, he has made a poor choice of subject matter. If you purport to write history, there exists an obligation to do your research! Betraying the fact that he didn't, apparently, bother to research or have the technical aspects proofread, tells me that Nelson isn't committed to accuracy, and that is a cardinal sin for a historian!

That begs the question: What basis does this sloppy approach give me for believing that anything else, including the non-technical, presented in this work as fact is accurately portrayed?

I agree that there are engaging passages, and sometimes an interesting and unusual slant on events, but if you want an engaging, ACCURATE account of Apollo 11, read Mike Collin's "Carrying the Fire" (he really is the most literate of the moon voyagers, and the most dryly humorous) , or for the project as a whole through the eyes of the astronauts, Andrew Chaikin's superb "A Man on the Moon". "Rocket Men" is for me an interesting approach that needs a major overhaul to become a decent book.