8 Space Exploration Books to Add to Your TBR – Book Riot

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Jaime Herndon finished her MFA in nonfiction writing at Columbia, after leaving a life of psychosocial oncology and maternal-child health work. She is a writer, editor, and book reviewer who drinks way too much coffee. She is a new-ish mom, so the coffee comes in extra handy. Twitter:@IvyTarHeelJaime

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Space exploration: even those words alone sound monumentalat least to me. Exploring space feels sort of like a misnomer, though the cosmos is so vast that we have barely explored any of it, in all honesty. But at the same time, those two words hold a lot of promise and hint at what could be discovered in the future. And thats pretty exciting to think about when it comes to space exploration books.

With so much out there and so much to explore, theres a wide variety of books if youd like to read more about it. NASA was created in 1958, and the space shuttle program formally began in 1972. While the shuttle program ended in 2011, that doesnt mean we arent exploring space: theres the James Webb Space Telescope, the rovers Curiosity and Perseverance, and SpaceX missions, to name just a few ways were still exploring.

Ive put together some great books to check out for anyone interested in space exploration. While I couldnt list all of them, there are also other great titles like Reaching for the Stars by Jos M. Hernndez, Escaping Gravity: My Quest to Transform NASA and Launch a New Space Age by Lori Carver, and the forthcoming book Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space by Adam Higginbotham.

Grab your favorite snack, get cozy, and lets dive in!

I got this for my son when we started our astronomy unit in homeschool back in September, and I dont think hes stopped reading and rereading it since then. Its a constant fixture in his playroom while he builds his LEGO spacecrafts. Its a Lonely Planet Kids book, so you know its going to be good, and it doesnt disappoint. Anything your kid (or you) wanted to know about space exploration? Its probably in here: history, important people, different spacecrafts, future goals, practical issues, and much, much more, all of which are accompanied by plenty of pictures, infographics, and maps.

My only complaint about this book is that even at over 400 pages, its too short. I simply wanted more: more stories, more information, and more time with these astronauts. Grush writes about the first six women astronauts chosen in 1978: Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Anna Fisher, Kathy Sullivan, Shannon Lucid, and Rhea Seddon. She writes about their journey to NASA, their contributions to the field, and the challenges they faced as women in the space program.

Theres been a lot of talk about colonizing Mars, but just because it might be an option, is it really something we should do? Kelly and Zach Weinersmith take this topic on, and the result is a funny, information-packed guide to space exploration and possible space settlements, answering almost any question under the sun about undertaking such a thing. They explore the geopolitical impacts and considerations, legalities, making babies in space, and intricacies of daily life and those are just some of the topics here. Its a thought-provoking, entertaining, but also serious book about how much we dont know about the practical things we take for granted here about the basic details of life.

We take for granted the diversity of astronauts (which, yes, could still be improved) but it hasnt always been that way not at all. Bagby writes about the 1978 astronaut class of NASA, which included the first women, the first African Americans, the first Asian American, and the first LGBTQ+ individual to go to space. Nicknamed The F*cking New Guys, this was quite a departure from previous classes and was full of egos, ambition, brilliance, and personality clashes. This book gives you not only a front-row seat to the interpersonal aspects of the class but also a look at the program itself at a time of monumental change and growth.

If you want even more space books, check out this post on books about the moon and this post featuring books about astrophysics and space.

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8 Space Exploration Books to Add to Your TBR - Book Riot