Rocket Age

The Race to the Moon and What It Took to Get There

By: George D. Morgan

Narrated by: Christopher Douyard

Rocket Age traces the history of spaceflight innovation from Robert Goddard's early experiments with liquid fuel rockets, through World War II and the work of Wernher von Braun and his German engineers, on to the postwar improvements made by Sergei Korolev and his team in the Soviet Union, and culminating with the historic moon walk made by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on July 20, 1969.

From designers to engineers, and even communication specialists and the builders who assembled these towering rockets, hundreds of thousands of people worked on getting humans to the moon, yet only a few have been recognized for their contributions. George D. Morgan sets the record straight by giving these forgotten figures of space travel their due.

The son of rocket scientists who worked directly on NASA projects Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo, Morgan gives behind-the-scenes details on the famous missions, including a rare interview with Dieter Huzel-Wernher von Braun's right-hand man and a chief engineer on every major manned space program. Even the most voracious readers of US space flight history will find new things to discover in this book. Rocket Age shines a light on those that have for too long been left out of the picture of the race to land on the moon.

©2020 George D. Morgan (P)2020 Tantor

Narrator is great!

Narrator is smooth and easily understandable, even at 1.6, which is what I usually listen to my books on. The story is great and follows the lead up to the first person on the moon well. Even though I’ve studied this subject fairly thoroughly, there were several fun facts that I heard for the first time. If you love the space race this book is for you.

Average at best

The claim in the book description, about how details would be uncovered regarding many of the people involved behind the scenes during early space flight, was exaggerated. It wasn't any more detailed about such people or events than any other books I've listened to or read in this genre. If anything, it was lacking some important details, and had somewhat dull filler in place of those details.

The narrator wasn't horrible; but half the time his performance made me think of high school students being forced to read in front of the class when they have no clue how to give an entertaining delivery.

There are much better options in this genre, but this one is good enough if you've already worked through the others, and you just want more space crack or you'll die.