Space

Historical fiction and I aren't the greatest of friends but occasionally we meet and dance and drink and have a good time, as was the case with Space. Michener does a damn good job of mixing history with fiction, I couldn't stop reading this.

It’s interesting to read this book nearly 40 years after it’s publication and to see how the basic science that essentially jump started the space race has become so integrated into mainstream education. It is also interesting, and more disturbing, to see how much commercialism is becoming a driver of such work today.

In many ways, this is a typical Michener book, but with a less expansive scope and cast of characters. It works for me and I rank this effort right up there with some of my favorites. Not all of the characters worked for me (Mott, Strabismus, Grant) but some really did (Pope [Penny and John], Claggett, Kolff).

Thick and thin... 800 pages thick but thin everywhere else. Michener didn't seem to know when to end the book, despite many opportunities. Still, I was always enthralled with the Apollo program and NASA, so the backdrop adds a star to the rating.

I wonder what Michener would have thought of some of his more disturbing story elements coming true. The country heading backward into the dark ages, science losing to ignorance, NASA becoming inconsequential...sad.

I'd never read any Michener before. For some reason I thought he was supposed to be a brilliant writer, one of the giants of American literature.

My mistake! Space was surprisingly dull, and not at all well-written. Simply put, it plodded. It's a fictionalized story of the space program, with some references to some actual astronauts thrown in - plus a fictionalized US state, which was one of two things which stuck in my memory from the book.

The other thing was a rather nasty assessment of golden age science fiction writers, all of whom (I'm sorry to say) were more talented writers than Mr. Michener.

Space had the feel of one of those potboilers that sits on the New York Times best-seller list for many weeks...something written for the show more lowest common denominator. It wasn't awful, mind you, just dull and awkward. Shogun, which I'd put in the same general class of "giant best-sellers" is far better written than Space. show less

I loved some of Michener's other long books, so I figured this might be a fun read. Well, in fact this is one of the more boring space-oriented novels I've come across. In part, since it was written in the early 80's, and based on research Michener did in the 70's, there was only so much he could write about that would touch space exploration and space science more directly. Still, this novel is really not about space so much as it is a drawn out, poorly paced, jumbled account of 6 early astronauts in NASA's moon landing program, with a bit about how NASA came to be, and a few other related threads, all of which could be so much more interesting than they turn out to be in this novel. In addition, the author's sympathy seems to be with show more the ultra-conservative characters he describes, making it hard for me, as a modern, female reader, to relate to the characters and their problems. Of course, bow, we have had female astronauts, and we've landed rovers on Mars that send us color photos of the surface daily, and we just had a Pluto flyby with photos. We also have still never landed another person on the moon yet since the program described in this book ended. The reasons why we 'doomed' ourselves to not have another moon landing are brought up in this novel, and there are other interesting themes and ideas throughout this book, but related in a rather mind-numbing manner that allows the reader to feel the ponderousness of this long book, one slow page at a time. It could have been worse, but this is not one of Micheners best books. show less

My least favorite so far from Michener. I did enjoy the science parts but not so much the fiction parts. It was a real slog to finish. I felt it could have been 200 less and all the better for it.

LOVED this book!! Great plot, believable characters, some non-fiction mixed in with fiction.
My favorite James Michener book thus far.