Tag Archives: women

Fighting for Space

Posted on August 11, 2022 by smellincoffee

Fighting for Space: Two Pilots and their Historic Battle for Female Spaceflight© 2020 Amy Shira Teitel448 pages When the age of flight arrived,   women were as eager to take to the skies as men.  Fighting for Space is a … Continue reading →

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Handprints on Hubble

Posted on July 18, 2022 by smellincoffee

Handprints on Hubble(c) 2019 Kathryn D. Sullivan304 pages Handprints on Hubble is a unique astronaut memoir, in part because Dr. Sullivan is a scientist first and an astronaut second. Longing to explore, she began her academic life in oceanography before realizing … Continue reading →

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The Burning Blue

Posted on July 14, 2022 by smellincoffee

The Burning Blue: The Untold Story of Christa McAuliffe and NASA’s Challenger Disaster(c) 2021 Kevin Cook288 pages So fickle is the human mind that even Apollo could not keep the public terribly excited for very long after the first moon … Continue reading →

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Irreversible Damage

Posted on March 25, 2022 by smellincoffee

Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters© 2020 Abigail Shrier276 pages To the degree that gender dysphoria existed prior to 2015, it was almost wholly the domain of young boys.  In the last ten years, however, claims of dysphoria … Continue reading →

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Gone with the Wind

Posted on March 15, 2022 by smellincoffee

Gone with the Wind© 1936 Margaret Mitchell1037 pages It’s been nearly twenty years since I visited the joined worlds of antebellum Tara and postwar Atlanta, tied together through the life of a ruined plantation belle turned business magnate, Scarlett O’Hara. … Continue reading →

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February 2022 in Review

Posted on March 1, 2022 by smellincoffee

I read a lot of books in February. Few of them applied to my challenges, though. The good news is that I continue to make progress on my great and worthy opponent, Mount TBR. Climbing Mount Doom (Base goal: read … Continue reading →

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Studying naked people

Posted on December 2, 2021 by smellincoffee

The Naked Woman: A Study of the Female Body © 2005 Desmond MorrisThe Naked Man: A Study of the Male Body © 2009 Desmond Morris Years ago I read Desmond Morris’ The Naked Ape, an anthropological look at humanity. In scrutinizing human beings’ animal … Continue reading →

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Books books books

Posted on October 14, 2021 by smellincoffee

Between the nonfunctional hospital wifi and the only decent television programs being overtaken by baseball, most of my entertainment last week was good ol’ fashioned books. Midnight at Chernobyl popped onto my radar after I watched the excellent HBO series … Continue reading →

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Back to Earth

Posted on August 13, 2021 by smellincoffee

Back to Earth: What Life in Space Taught Me About Our Home Planet and our Mission to Protect It© 2021 Nicola Stott304 pages A staple of astronaut memoirs is the attempt to communicate the near-religious experience of seeing the Earth … Continue reading →

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Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars

Posted on July 30, 2021 by smellincoffee

Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars© 2021 Eileen Collins314 pages Eileen Collins was obsessed with flying. Maybe it was an unusual preoccupation for a girl, but her parents – despite their struggles with mental illness and alcoholism – always … Continue reading →

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