Description
David Harland proposes a series of books on the theme of NASAs Moon Program of the 1960s and early 1970s. Presented chronologically, NASAs Moon Program The Early Years will outline the Mercury and Gemini manned missions, the unmanned lunar probes and the Apollo missions leading up to Apollo 11, covering that mission only as a postscript. The First Men on the Moon The Story of Apollo 11 due for release in September 2006 is devoted solely to that mission. Apollo The Definitive Sourcebook published in 2006 covered all the missions, including the unmanned tests, in an encyclopaedic style which cited facts and figures in a stylised manner. Exploring the Moon The Apollo Expeditions was published in 1999, focusing on the final three Apollo missions, and covered only their activities on the lunar surface. A fully re-illustrated second edition with colour illustrations will be released in 2008. The individual mission books in this series will relate to the planning, flight and results, and be written in the same style as The First Men on the Moon The Story of Apollo 11; i.e. using dialogue from the in-flight transcripts (including some conversations never broadcast) to bring their stories to life. With the release of the book on Apollo 11 David Harland will then cover the other five missions that landed on the Moon, concluding by 2012 the 40th anniversary of the last Apollo mission. Each of the Apollo missions that reached the Moon deserves its own book-lenth account covering planning, the flight, and the scientific results. This series will become the definitive account of the Apollo era. It will give the Springer/Praxis list unrivalled coverage of the Apollo era of space explorationas the 40th anniversary approaches in 2009 and the world looks back with a sense of wonderment at the achievement. Plans are already in train for a return to the Moon by 2020 to create a Moonbase.
