Book Description
for How We Got to the Moon by John Rocco
From Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
A captivating account of how the U.S. space program achieved the goal of landing on the moon blends abundant visuals with a compelling, substantial text that illuminates myriad facets of the effort. While the book moves chronologically from idea to successful outcome, it's divided into sections that emphasize various aspects of the endeavor: "A Race to the Moon" (the Cold War political context), "Designing a Moon Rocket," "Building a Launch Vehicle," "Staying Alive in Space," "Support on the Ground," and "We Choose to Go to the Moon." Throughout, both the technological story and the human story of the Apollo program-including the critical role of human creativity and imagination-are given equal measure, with sidebars offering profiles of some of the people and science and engineering concepts. The volume displays a welcome, intentional effort to include diverse individuals across many components of the Apollo program, scientists to seamstresses, factory workers to engineers to astronauts. The art ranges from schematics, diagrams, and close-ups of equipment to portraits accompanying the profiles to more sweeping views providing context. Individual readers will likely find some aspects more interesting than others, but the format makes it easy to linger where desired, even as it incites eagerness about what every turn of the page will bring in this enticing, impressive volume. End matter includes a list of Apollo missions, research note, sources, and suggestions for "further exploration." (Age 9 and older)
CCBC Choices 2021. © Cooperative Children's Book Center, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison, 2021. Used with permission.