Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid

 

Summary (from the publisher): Joan Goodwin has been obsessed with the stars for as long as she can remember. Thoughtful and reserved, Joan is content with her life as a professor of physics and astronomy at Rice University and as aunt to her precocious niece, Frances. That is, until she comes across an advertisement seeking the first women scientists to join NASA’s space shuttle program. Suddenly, Joan burns to be one of the few people to go to space.

Selected from a pool of thousands of applicants in the summer of 1980, Joan begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates: Top Gun pilot Hank Redmond and scientist John Griffin, who are kind and easygoing even when the stakes are highest; mission specialist Lydia Danes, who has worked too hard to play nice; warmhearted Donna Fitzgerald, who is navigating her own secrets; and Vanessa Ford, the magnetic and mysterious aeronautical engineer, who can fix any engine and fly any plane.

As the new astronauts become unlikely friends and prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined. In this new light, Joan begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her place in the observable universe.

Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, it all changes in an instant.

Fast-paced, thrilling, and emotional, Atmosphere is Taylor Jenkins Reid at her best: transporting readers to iconic times and places, creating complex protagonists, and telling a passionate and soaring story about the transformative power of love—this time among the stars.

Review: This wins major points for a unique plot, major tension/anxiety, and emotional devastation. This is both a beautiful LGBTQ+ love story and an exciting space plotline. 

Joan Goodwin is a professor physics and astronomy at Rice University, devoted to her young niece, Frances. She is shocked when she is one of thousands selected to join NASA's space shuttle program in the summer of 1980. Slowly she becomes close friends with many of the fellow astronauts, especially Vanessa Ford, the mysterious and private aeronautical engineer, who dreams of flying a shuttle. 

This structure of this book works so well. The novel opens during a mission in 1984, when the flight begins to go wrong. As a reader, you know that lives are at stake. Only then do we go back in time to see how they all got to this point. With time, the reader gets to know the different characters more and more so that by the end, the concern for their safety becomes sky-high. I do have to say that so many people warned me to have my tissues handy for this one, so I was steeling myself the whole book. And they were not wrong! I was so emotional by the end of this but still didn't entirely predict the ending.

I really loved Joan and Vanessa. They have many barriers preventing their relationship but are always happy to just get what they can out of life, which somehow felt even more heartbreaking. I will say reading it that it didn't read like the 1980s but more like the 1950s or earlier. I understand that a huge part of the secrecy around the true nature of their relationship was due to NASA's restrictions and wanting to protect their jobs, but they also seemed to fear societal and familial censure, and it didn't quite seem accurate for the time period. 

One element I did really love about this was the connection between Joan and her niece Frances. Frances' mom (Joan's sister), Barbara is the WORST. Self-centered, inattentive, selfish - you name it, Barbara does it. She is not a great mom, but Joan always shows up to fill in the gaps for her niece. I love how much Joan prioritizes her niece, even at the expense of some of her career choices and personal relationships. She is willing to sacrifice for Frances in a way that no one else will. Sidebar, where were the grandparents?? Why were they so absent and never helped with Frances at all? 

I will say that a lot of the technical space language went over my head and had me glazing over. There was also an exceedingly long scene detailing lots of astronomical details that could have been shorter and did not hold my interest. But most of the chapters are more about the past and laying the groundwork and not technical scenes in space, so these sections were in the minority. 

Just a note that I switched back and forth between the physical book and audio. The audio was so well done with narrator Julia Whelan. However, I did have a harder time following the few chapters that have more technical language on audio so was glad I had the physical copy as well. 

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