Robert A. Black, Mathematical Storyteller

I had a pretty fun time on The Space Show this past Sunday. The first half-hour or so turned out to be more about my time writing for You Can't Do That On Television than anything else, but eventually we got around to Lunar Pioneers . I hope everyone who heard me enjoyed the program. The podcast is now online at the Space Show website. You can find it here . Meanwhile, I'll have some excerpts posted in a few days.

The PBS series Nova has turned out some really great episodes about the space program over the years, and last night's episode was no exception. "Space Shuttle Disaster" took a look at the 2003 Columbia accident - not just the accident itself, but the social and political factors around it, through the past and into the future. They made a good case for the claim that the Columbia accident was a product of the environment that made the Shuttle what it was in the first place, and then explored the ways that the accident has changed NASA's plans for the future. If you missed it, you can look for your local PBS station to rerun it, or go here to watch it online: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/columbia/program.html Meanwhile, I've got a space show of my own to do. The Space Show, in fact: I'll be on the air from 12:00noon to 1:30pm Pacific Time this Sunday , talking about Lunar Pioneers . You can hear the show streamed live from the Space Show website or do...

This is my author blog, where I write about things related to my books. With that in mind, my aim is to avoid politics as much as I can. If you want to know who I support for president this year, I've made that pretty clear in other places around the net. I don't need to repeat it here. Nevertheless, I wanted to point out this new opinion piece in the New York Times - "Houston, We Have a Problem" . It's about the challenges facing our next president, whoever he may be, if the US is to keep its leadership role in space. The columnist asserts that, "Not since John F. Kennedy, has a president truly understood the incalculable value of space." It's a credible claim. Richard Nixon killed the Apollo program. Ronald Reagan gave us the International Space Station, but with so little support that today's scaled-down version still isn't finished. George H.W. Bush tried to interest us in Mars, but failed to follow up his initial proposal. Bill...

...and they're a mixed bag, as reviews always are. But that mix looks rather curious to me. On Amazon.com , I've got a review from a 37-year veteran high school science teacher, who praises my book as being "scientifically accurate." I've also heard from the reviewer at the " Lunar Library " at OutOfTheCradle.net, who tells me he thinks "the book would be great for schools." But then there was the reviewer at the National Space Society, a former NASA flight controller, who absolutely hated the book, and proceeded to write me a long diatribe pointing out all the things I got wrong. And she didn't even make it all the way through the book. (Just as an aside, this is exactly why I decided not to be a science-fiction writer. No matter how hard you work to get all your details right, there's always someone who will come along and pick at everything you missed. It's the nature of the fandom.) As I said, every book, movie, play, TV ...