- Hardcover: 384 pages
- Publisher: Harcourt; 1 edition (Jan 2003)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0151004676
- ISBN-13: 978-0151004676
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 16.1 x 3.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 535,671 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Since Gordon Cooper published his autobiography in the year 2000, there was only one Mercury astronaut remaining who had not written his own book about his space experiences. Many wondered if Scott Carpenter, in many ways the most enigmatic of the living astronauts of that era, would ever do so.
Carpenter, after all, had come in for a withering printed attack in 2001, when former NASA flight director Chris Kraft published his autobiography, "Flight." In the four decades that have passed since his space flight, Carpenter had endured many remarks about his piloting skills on his space flight with his characteristic good grace. With the publishing of Kraft's book, however, it was beginning to look like Kraft's views would become the accepted version of events for historians to use. A response was needed to give the other side of the story - and, thankfully, Scott Carpenter has written it. The resulting book is co-authored with Carpenter's daughter, Kris Stoever, who was six years old when her father became the second American to orbit the Earth. The book offers a level-headed, clear response to the accusations that Kraft and others made, offering unique insights into the flight of Aurora 7 from the man who was there.
This book is far more than a response to others. Carpenter and Stoever open by weaving a warm family history of growing up in Boulder, Colorado in the 1920s, using extracts from family letters to give unexpectedly vivid insights into an era that was already passing away with Carpenter's grandfather's generation. The book, however, is no cozy, romantic trip to a bygone idyll; the letters they wrote to each other portray a splintering, disintegrating marriage in which young Scott could not rely on either of his parents for his needs. Unlike many books about American heroes, this book is honest about events such as Carpenter's teenage years, when he would upset his neighbors with his cursing and acquired a BB gun which he used to shoot out city street lights.
The family history would make a great and readable book in itself but, of course, Carpenter and Stoever also cover in fascinating detail Carpenter's test piloting years, his selection as an astronaut, and the background behind the exploration of this new frontier. He gives a thorough technical account of the flight, explaining what went right, what went wrong and why, removing the petty sniping of other authors and showing how he managed to work as a test pilot and a scientist at the same moment, and still get home alive. The reader also sees that Carpenter had more of a deep fascination in space itself than any other astronaut of that era - he truly experienced space, and it is fascinating to read just how. I highly recommend this book.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Supposedly, Scott Carpenter was the Mercury astronaut who didn't quite have the Right Stuff. Maybe he screwed up his one spaceflight. Why didn't he get a Gemini flight? Most of the questions about Scott's early career, and more besides, are answered in this beautifully written book. More than a biography or autobiography, it also gives a tantalising glimpse into Pioneer-time Colorado and Depression-era America, which whets the appetite for more details of both. This, surely, is due to the book's co-author, Kris Stoever, Carpenter's daughter, and a trained historian.
My only disappointment is that, whereas most astronauts' careers followed pretty similar paths, Scott's did not; instead of heading for Outer Space after his first and only mission, he opted for Inner Space and the Navy's Man in the Sea Sealab Project. I know very little about this and would have been keen to learn much more; sadly, the book only accords a few pages to the undertaking.
Altogether, though, the book is a touching and scholarly appraisal of one of the lesser-known astronauts.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
22 reviews
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Worth the Long Wait
28 Dec 2002
Format:Hardcover
My interest in manned spacecraft was first piqued by the much-delayed Mercury flight of John Glenn, and I followed the subsequent 1962 mission of Scott Carpenter aboard his Aurora 7 spacecraft with even greater enthusiasm. As the decades passed and other Mercury astronauts wrote their autobiographies, I began to wonder if Scott Carpenter was ever going to tell his story, which I have always found to be far more exciting and multi-dimensional than those told by most of his colleagues. I was certainly not disappointed. "For Spacious Skies" is a truly wonderful and well written book, and gives an enjoyable background to a man about whom there has often been much speculation and interest - particularly in recent years when a certain NASA flight controller decided to vent his spleen on Carpenter and his Mercury mission in his own memoirs. This book is, in part, an obvious response to this criticism, and certainly clears the decks in many ways. Better written and far more readable than most of the other Mercury Seven astronaut biographies, this is a touching and often dramatic account of the life of a man who is regarded as one of the true pioneers and adventurers of spaceflight. Dealt many poor hands in life, he nevertheless seized his opportunities when they came along, and his resolve comes through loud and clear in this book. While many space enthusiasts and historians know that Scott Carpenter's story will, sadly, never be free of the controversies that attend his life and his single Mercury orbital mission, his flight should nevertheless be remembered as a very important and major contribution to the state of spaceflight knowledge in those early days, when brave men rode rockets that had a worrying reputation for blowing up. He and his co-author daughter Kris have now set the record straight on those controversies with the same intensity, determination and focus that characterized his time as an astronaut, and later as an aquanaut researcher in the service of his nation. No collection of astronaut autobiographies and biographies could ever be considered complete without this wonderful, evocative and powerful book.
23 of 25 people found the following review helpful
We Finally Hear Carpenter's Story
17 Aug 2003
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Scott Carpenter has the worst reputation of the Mercury Seven. Chris Kraft's book "Flight" dedicates a complete chapter to attacking Carpenter. Using numerous footnotes, the book references many NASA reports which cite a mechanical failure which nearly doomed his mission.
The book seems to be a family history written by Carpenter's daughter, Kris Stoever. Thus, the reader must adjust to reading about Carpenter in the third person. Carpenter does take over in the chapters about his flight, writing in the first person. Adding to the difficulty reading the book, the writers assume that the reader can keep track of the year different events happened. However, the story is not chronilogical, so one must guess at the year when signifigant events (child birth, transfer to a new Navy base) occur. Too bad this book did not do a better job of completing the timeline for the reader. Particularly surprising his how Carpenter's last three marriages are summarized in a 6-line paragraph on the second to last page.
I recommend reading this book if you want to hear Carpenter's view of his flight. But be prepared to for a bumpy ride, as the book is not pulled together into the consistent story one would expect.
21 of 23 people found the following review helpful
Interesting. But . . .
13 May 2003
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
I love reading about flying in space. And this book by a real hero is good. But not great. It is mostly written by his daughter, in the third person. You don't get that 'up close' feel. You get slighty dry text. I did learn about an amazing time, an amazing journey, but would have liked a little more.
If you love this subject, then this is a must have book. But if are new to reading about the early space program, there are better books to start with. Follow some of the links, search a little, and then come back and get this book if you are hooked.
If you love this subject, then this is a must have book. But if are new to reading about the early space program, there are better books to start with. Follow some of the links, search a little, and then come back and get this book if you are hooked.
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