Nasa Space Vehicles: Capsules, Shuttles, and Space Stations (Countdown to Space)

Cole, Michael D.

ISBN 10: 0766013081 ISBN 13: 9780766013087

Publisher: Enslow Pub Inc, 2000

Synopsis

Describes American space vehicles and their uses, including various space probes, the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo capsules, Skylab, the space shuttles, and the International Space Station.

About this title

From School Library Journal:

Grade 4-6-Cole's cursory survey of NASA spacecraft, from the Mercury capsule to the International Space Station, reads like a series of snapshots, and won't leave readers much enlightened about the structure or capabilities of these gloriously complicated machines. The illustrations, mostly small color photos or artists' impressions, are both scant and poorly chosen. Throughout the entire first chapter, for instance, the author trumpets the space shuttle's ability to come to a controlled landing (given excellent piloting), but there is no diagram or close-up of its landing gear or controls. Similarly, the interiors of the Mercury and Apollo capsules are described in relative detail, but shown only in partial, thumbnail-sized cutaways-which is more than the shuttle gets. Several times, Cole wanders from his physical descriptions for tangential accounts of individual missions, then fills out the final chapter by shoveling in bare mentions of the Hubble Space Telescope and a handful of unmanned space probes. The back matter includes an irrelevant Web site about Russian space vehicles. Collections already containing Peter Bond's DK Guide to Space (DK, 1999) or books on the individual space programs, such as Diane and Paul Sipiera's Project Mercury and Project Gemini (both Children's, 1997) will find this title superfluous.
John Peters, New York Public Library
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Enslow Pub Inc
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0766013081
• ISBN 13: 9780766013087
• Binding: Library Binding
• Number of pages: 48