Craig Nelson (1) (1955–)
Autore di Rocket Men: The Epic Story of the First Men on the Moon
Per altri autori con il nome Craig Nelson, vedi la pagina di disambiguazione.
Sull'Autore
Craig Nelson was an editor at HarperCollins, Hyperion, and Random House for almost twenty years. He lives in New York City.
Opere di Craig Nelson
Etichette
Informazioni generali
- Data di nascita
- 1955-02-06
- Sesso
- male
- Nazionalità
- USA
- Luogo di residenza
- Greenwich Village, New York, USA
- Istruzione
- University of Texas, Austin
- Attività lavorative
- writer
editor
executive editor
vice president (Harper & Row, Hyperion, Random House, and Villard)
literary agent - Organizzazioni
- Boy Scouts of America (Eagle Scout)
- Agente
- Stuart Krichevsky
Utenti
Recensioni
The Age of Radiance: The Epic Rise and Dramatic Fall… di Craig Nelson
Dnf, too focused on the lives of the nanes involved and not enough on the era
I found this to be truly informative and interesting. There's so much about space exploration which we take for granted today - it's become somewhat routine. but this book brings back the early days, the pioneering days of space exploration, telling the stories you either forgot, or more likely, never even knew nor appreciated. There are great insights and stories about our early space program, including the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs, and the men (and women) who contributed.
I wanted badly to like this book. It's about the nerdiest of nerds, guys who literally wore pocket protectors and carried around slide rules, and yet managed to land a dozen human beings on a rock floating through space.
Never has the use of precisely controlled unfathomably large explosions to propel a massive vehicle into the heavens managed to seem so boring. I get that the vast majority of the guys you're talking to were the engineers whose professional lives definitely peaked when they launched dudes into space, but that's where you, as the writer, are supposed to work your magic. Even oral histories tend to use editing to make things seem connected, and make sense, and maybe even work out a logical structure, please?
But no. There's a common format for works about monumental events: You start right around the most exciting time, then leave the reader hanging on a pivotal moment as you circle back and start at the beginning. The thought, I suppose, is to hook the reader's interest so you can explain what led up to it (ignoring the fact that the personal already bought a multiple-hundred-page book about the topic). In this case, the author liked it so much he used it twice: We start a few months out and tiptoe right up to the Apollo 11 launch ... then we back up to the beginning of the Apollo 11 program, when it looks like it might not launch at all. Then, after we get about to where we started ... we back up to the entire history of rocketry and missiles.
If it sounds confusing and disjointed, that's because it is.
But it's not the only issue. From ninth-grade essays up to the latest historical monographs, the best writing tends to be done by those with a passionate interest in the topic. Which makes total sense! Frankly, if you're pounding out a couple hundred pages on a topic that bores you to death, it's unlikely anyone is going to derive any enjoyment from reading it (see: Every primary/secondary education textbook ever).
But there's a distinction you have to draw between interest and advocation when you're writing objectively: In the same way I don't 100 percent trust everything Fox News or the Huffington Post says without third-party verification, I'm also gonna need a little bit more background before I swallow the entirety of Winston Churchill's History of English-Speaking Peoples (spoiler alert: The British come off pretty good in it).
Rocket Men Author Craig Nelson is a homer of the highest order who, if he doesn't actuallly believe it himself, let the astronauts and people deeply involved with the space program inform too much of the narrative thrust of the book.
To be clear, I think the Apollo program (which is mostly what this book chronicles) was a masterful effort of technology, government, politics, engineering and human spirit. Landing on the moon is probably the most significant event for the human species to date. But that doesn't necessarily mean that we should be spending trillions of dollars to put a man on Mars, and I resent the implication that questioning that notion makes me unpatriotic or terminally short-sighted.
I really do think it's unfortunate. There are great stories, anecdotes and personalities on display throughout Rocket Men, and the author clearly did an enormous amount of research bringing it all together. I just wish he would have focused a little bit more effort on the writing part, too.… (altro)
Never has the use of precisely controlled unfathomably large explosions to propel a massive vehicle into the heavens managed to seem so boring. I get that the vast majority of the guys you're talking to were the engineers whose professional lives definitely peaked when they launched dudes into space, but that's where you, as the writer, are supposed to work your magic. Even oral histories tend to use editing to make things seem connected, and make sense, and maybe even work out a logical structure, please?
But no. There's a common format for works about monumental events: You start right around the most exciting time, then leave the reader hanging on a pivotal moment as you circle back and start at the beginning. The thought, I suppose, is to hook the reader's interest so you can explain what led up to it (ignoring the fact that the personal already bought a multiple-hundred-page book about the topic). In this case, the author liked it so much he used it twice: We start a few months out and tiptoe right up to the Apollo 11 launch ... then we back up to the beginning of the Apollo 11 program, when it looks like it might not launch at all. Then, after we get about to where we started ... we back up to the entire history of rocketry and missiles.
If it sounds confusing and disjointed, that's because it is.
But it's not the only issue. From ninth-grade essays up to the latest historical monographs, the best writing tends to be done by those with a passionate interest in the topic. Which makes total sense! Frankly, if you're pounding out a couple hundred pages on a topic that bores you to death, it's unlikely anyone is going to derive any enjoyment from reading it (see: Every primary/secondary education textbook ever).
But there's a distinction you have to draw between interest and advocation when you're writing objectively: In the same way I don't 100 percent trust everything Fox News or the Huffington Post says without third-party verification, I'm also gonna need a little bit more background before I swallow the entirety of Winston Churchill's History of English-Speaking Peoples (spoiler alert: The British come off pretty good in it).
Rocket Men Author Craig Nelson is a homer of the highest order who, if he doesn't actuallly believe it himself, let the astronauts and people deeply involved with the space program inform too much of the narrative thrust of the book.
To be clear, I think the Apollo program (which is mostly what this book chronicles) was a masterful effort of technology, government, politics, engineering and human spirit. Landing on the moon is probably the most significant event for the human species to date. But that doesn't necessarily mean that we should be spending trillions of dollars to put a man on Mars, and I resent the implication that questioning that notion makes me unpatriotic or terminally short-sighted.
I really do think it's unfortunate. There are great stories, anecdotes and personalities on display throughout Rocket Men, and the author clearly did an enormous amount of research bringing it all together. I just wish he would have focused a little bit more effort on the writing part, too.… (altro)
Well done and comprehensive. Low impact, high visibility. Audacious, courageous, well planned and executed.
Liste
Premi e riconoscimenti
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Autori correlati
Statistiche
- Opere
- 8
- Utenti
- 1,738
- Popolarità
- #14,800
- Voto
- 3.9
- Recensioni
- 32
- ISBN
- 85
- Lingue
- 3
