Endurance by Scott Kelly, book review
Endurance
by Scott Kelly
Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf
Publish Date: October 17, 2017
As someone who has attended so many shuttle launches (one of which was Mr. Kelly’s flight in 1999) and landings and dreams of what its like to be in space, I was stoked to find out I was being given Endurance by Scott Kelly to review.
I find outer space fascinating I follow the flight paths of the International Space Station (ISS)(which oddly enough will be crossing over my home at 6:22 p.m. tonight, and I am planning on watching it travel along on its journey with my high power binoculars). This book adds to my fascination.
Retired Astronaut Scott Kelly is the longest occupying American resident of the ISS with 340 straight days in 2015-2016.
Endurance is his memoir of that record-breaking stay and the rest of his “Lifetime of Discovery.”
Selected to a "year-long mission" starting with Expedition 43, he then commanded Expedition 44 and 45, Mr. Kelly had put into practice what it was like to live on the Space Station two years before with his 5 months stay on the ISS during Expedition 26. His life journey through hardships in his childhood, his service in the Navy as a Pilot, fighting Prostate Cancer and those months of Expedition 43 prepared him for what came next.
Endurance is the closest I will ever get to space and I ate up every word Mr. Kelly wrote. His struggles from being away from his family, his relationships, his joys, his mental and physical health, working with various countries Astronauts delving in Biomedical Engineering, his vivid explanations of the day to day jobs he completed were like a sci-fi novel turned reality.
Can you imagine what it would be like to look at the earth and see it in all its glory, it’s distinguishing attributes? You don’t have to, Mr. Kelly gives you his view and feelings on what it is like. He makes you feel as if you are there, working, playing and traveling through zero gravity.
The knowledge that you don’t have control over anything that happens on earth to your family is something that Mr. Kelly finds out about when his sister-in-law Congresswoman Gabriella Giffords is shot in Arizona at a Safeway grocery store parking lot meeting with constituents. Mr. Kelly had a few months left of his stay.
A few things of what Mr. Kelly says of that experience, while leading the nation in a moment of silence concerning the horrific assassination attempt and deaths of six people and 13 injured that day in Tucson struck me as something to really chew on and change, and also some huge foreshadowing, “Those of us who have had the privilege to look down on the Earth from space get the chance to take a larger perspective of the planet and the people who share it. I feel more strongly than ever that we must do better” He explains after the moment of silence "on the space station, we followed our normal routine. But I knew that on Earth somethings would never be the same.”
Mr. Kelly’s life experiences told throughout this book show everyone that someone can come from obscurity and land into whatever they dream of becoming and beyond those dreams. This book is worth reading especially if you have any inkling of journeying from your own life to someone else’s and obviously if you love space exploration. This book hits one of my top five memoirs. Read it, you won’t regret it.
Thanks to Bookish First for sending me a copy of Endurance: A Year in Space, A lifetime of Discovery I thoroughly enjoyed it. This book was given to me in lieu of my honest opinion.
I find outer space fascinating I follow the flight paths of the International Space Station (ISS)(which oddly enough will be crossing over my home at 6:22 p.m. tonight, and I am planning on watching it travel along on its journey with my high power binoculars). This book adds to my fascination.
Retired Astronaut Scott Kelly is the longest occupying American resident of the ISS with 340 straight days in 2015-2016.
Endurance is his memoir of that record-breaking stay and the rest of his “Lifetime of Discovery.”
Selected to a "year-long mission" starting with Expedition 43, he then commanded Expedition 44 and 45, Mr. Kelly had put into practice what it was like to live on the Space Station two years before with his 5 months stay on the ISS during Expedition 26. His life journey through hardships in his childhood, his service in the Navy as a Pilot, fighting Prostate Cancer and those months of Expedition 43 prepared him for what came next.
Endurance is the closest I will ever get to space and I ate up every word Mr. Kelly wrote. His struggles from being away from his family, his relationships, his joys, his mental and physical health, working with various countries Astronauts delving in Biomedical Engineering, his vivid explanations of the day to day jobs he completed were like a sci-fi novel turned reality.
Can you imagine what it would be like to look at the earth and see it in all its glory, it’s distinguishing attributes? You don’t have to, Mr. Kelly gives you his view and feelings on what it is like. He makes you feel as if you are there, working, playing and traveling through zero gravity.
The knowledge that you don’t have control over anything that happens on earth to your family is something that Mr. Kelly finds out about when his sister-in-law Congresswoman Gabriella Giffords is shot in Arizona at a Safeway grocery store parking lot meeting with constituents. Mr. Kelly had a few months left of his stay.
A few things of what Mr. Kelly says of that experience, while leading the nation in a moment of silence concerning the horrific assassination attempt and deaths of six people and 13 injured that day in Tucson struck me as something to really chew on and change, and also some huge foreshadowing, “Those of us who have had the privilege to look down on the Earth from space get the chance to take a larger perspective of the planet and the people who share it. I feel more strongly than ever that we must do better” He explains after the moment of silence "on the space station, we followed our normal routine. But I knew that on Earth somethings would never be the same.”
Mr. Kelly’s life experiences told throughout this book show everyone that someone can come from obscurity and land into whatever they dream of becoming and beyond those dreams. This book is worth reading especially if you have any inkling of journeying from your own life to someone else’s and obviously if you love space exploration. This book hits one of my top five memoirs. Read it, you won’t regret it.
Thanks to Bookish First for sending me a copy of Endurance: A Year in Space, A lifetime of Discovery I thoroughly enjoyed it. This book was given to me in lieu of my honest opinion.
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