Oct 30

Oct 30 Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space

About the book

Author: Adam Higginbotham
Publisher: Avid Reader Press

More info:
The StoryGraph | Goodreads
Note: Content and trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the review.

Buy and support indie bookstores (+ I earn a small commission):
Bookshop.org (print) | Libro.fm (audio)

My Review

I downloaded this audiobook (thank you Penguin Audio!) because everyone I knew who’d read it was recommending it. And then when I was halfway through, it won the Kirkus Prize! So you don’t have to take my word for it when I say this book is totally worth reading.

Higginbotham’s journalism is good, but his ability to tell a story is top-notch. I’ll admit I had trouble grasping the finer details at times, although I never lost the overall plot. He’s very thorough in going all the way back to identify the origins of the organizational failures that led to the Challenger tragedy and making sure his readers have every piece of context they need (and then some). But then I hit the third and final section of the book — which details the events of the actual day of Challenger’s launch — and suddenly WHAM, I was on the edge of my seat and asking my husband, “DID YOU KNOW ___???”

I’m so glad the itch to get back into my nonfiction groove struck just in time to read this one before it won the Kirkus Prize! Definitely recommend.