Book Rec of the Day 4/14-4/15/2008

HISTORY IN A NOVEL

The action of Bahr’s novel takes place over only two days in 1864, when wounded Confederate rifleman Bushrod Carter is taken to a nearby house to recuperate from the Battle of Franklin (Tennessee). Preferred by many who have read it to Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain, the battle writing has been compared to that of Stephen Crane and Tolstoy. Bahr distilled 20 years of research into this vivid portrait of flesh and blood.

THE BLACK FLOWER: A NOVEL OF THE CIVIL WAR, by Howard Bahr (Picador USA, 2000)

BLAST OFF

Mike Mullane was a natural for the space shuttle program after flying 134 missions in Vietnam, but who knew he would be such an engaging writer? Addicted to flying, full of energy, and boyishly foulmouthed, Mullane is a sort of Everyman in the locker room. He became an astronaut in 1978, flew with the first women in the space program, overcame his own male chauvinism, and developed into a passionate and articulate observer (and critic) of NASA. This funny, earnest, patriotic, and colorful account never dips into smugness or self-congratulation and sometimes soars with the wonder and beauty of space.

RIDING ROCKETS: THE OUTRAGEOUS TALES OF A SPACE SHUTTLE ASTRONAUT, by Mike Mullane (Scribner, 2006)