Star Bound

A Beginner’s Guide to the American Space Program, From Goddard’s Rockets to Goldilocks Planets and Everything In Between

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About

Bruce McCandless III

Bruce McCandless III grew up in the shadow of Houston’s Johnson Space Center during the Apollo and Skylab eras, watching Batman and Buzz Aldrin with equal enthusiasm. He graduated from the Plan II Honors Program of the University of Texas at Austin and went on to earn an M.A. from the University of Reading in England and a J.D. from the UT School of Law. In addition to Wonders All Around: The Incredible True Story of Astronaut Bruce McCandless II and The First Untethered Flight in Space, published in 2021, Bruce is the author of the science fiction novel Sour Lake (2011), the modern fairy tale Beatrice and the Basilisk (2014), and the Western supernatural thriller In the Land of Dead Horses (2021). He has also published poems, features, and essays in a variety of journals, including the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Magazine, the Texas Observer, The Seattle Review, The Asian Wall Street Journal, Pleiades, Cold Mountain Review, and the Houston Chronicle. Bruce and his wife, Pati McCandless, live in Austin.

You can follow Bruce on Medium and keep up with him on Instagram.

Star Bound

A Beginner’s Guide to the American Space Program, from Goddard’s Rockets to Goldilocks Planets and Everything in Between

Star Bound is a book for anyone who wants to learn about the American space program but isn’t sure where to start. First and foremost, it’s a history—short, sweet, and straightforward. From rocketry pioneer Robert Goddard’s primitive flight tests in 1926 through the creation of NASA, from our first steps on the moon to construction of the International Space Station and planning a trip to Mars, readers will meet the people and projects that have put the United States at the forefront of space exploration. Along the way, they’ll learn:

  • How the United States beat the Soviets to the moon
  • Why astronauts float in space (Hint: It’s not for lack of gravity!)
  • How fast rockets have to go to stay in orbit around Earth
  • How we can “look back in time” through a space telescope

With technology evolving and humanity’s understanding of the universe expanding, we are entering an exciting period of space exploration. Authored by two veteran space writers with unique insights into the topic, Star Bound offers up the story of Americans in space with a focus on the cultural and societal contexts of the country’s most important missions rather than engineering and technical minutiae. Vibrant, positive, and humorous, Star Bound is packed with facts and stories for novice space fans. And sprinkled in with the history are lists of the greatest space songs, books, movies, and more—all designed to make space exploration accessible to even the casual reader.

Praise for Star Bound

Wonders All Around

The Man You Never Knew You Knew

It’s one of the most powerful and popular images in the history of space exploration: an astronaut in a snow-white spacesuit, floating untethered and alone in an expanse of blue. Bruce McCandless II is the man in that spacesuit, and Wonders All Around is the thoroughly engrossing, extensively researched story of his inspiring life and groundbreaking accomplishments, as told by his son, a gifted writer and storyteller.

McCandless, a Navy fighter pilot, joined NASA in 1966. He was Houston’s capsule communicator—the person talking to the astronauts—as Apollo 11’s Neil Armstrong made his giant leap for mankind in 1969. McCandless developed technology his fellow astronauts used until he himself rode Challenger into space on the tenth shuttle mission. But the road to that incredible feat was not the sure bet it should have been for such a gifted man.

Bruce McCandless II was an astronaut for 24 years, and his career reflects the accomplishments and accolades, the brilliance and broken hearts, of the men and women of the American space program from the mid-sixties through 1990. But Wonders All Around is more than a catalog of McCandless’s extraordinary achievements, which included work on the design, deployment, and repair of the Hubble Space Telescope. It is also a human tale of perseverance and devotion, disappointment and redemption.

Recounted with insight and humor, this book explores the relationship between a father and a son, men of two very different generations. And finally, it is an exploration of the character of one unique individual, and the courage, imagination, and tenacity that propelled him and his country to their place in the forefront of space history.

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Praise for Wonders All Around

Fiction

Bruce is also the author of the American Paladin series, two works (so far) of genre-bending fiction that combine fantasy, science fiction, and western themes.

In the Land of Dead Horses

In the Land of Dead Horses tells the story of Texas Ranger Jewel T. Lightfoot's 1908 pursuit of a resurrected horror from another age--a manifestation of the Mayan god of darkness, unearthed from its subterranean crypt in the wastelands of the Chihuahuan Desert and set loose on an unsuspecting world. The dead, it turns out, have no love for the living.

Sour Lake

It's 1911. Someone, or something, is leaving the good citizens of East Texas's Ochiltree County savagely mutilated and drained of blood. Slow-talking Sheriff Reeves Duncan, with the help of Texas Ranger Jewel Lightfoot and a motley crew of unimpressive gentlemen, needs to put an end to the murders, and soon. But it won't be easy. Because no one's ever seen a killer like this before. And some things are best left buried.

Praise for the American Paladin Series

Media Coverage

Contact

For media inquiries, contact bmccandless3@gmail.com.