The Time It Takes to Fall: A Novel

by Margaret Lazarus Dean

It is the early 1980s, and America is in love with space. Growing up in the shadow of Cape Canaveral, young Dolores Gray has it particularly she dreams of becoming an astronaut. At school, Dolores finds herself caught between her desire for popularity and her secret friendship with the smartest and most unpopular boy in her class, whose father is NASA's Director of Launch Safety. At home, discord begins to grow between her parents when her father's job as a NASA technician is threatened. Looking for escape, Dolores loses herself in her scrapbook, where she files away newspaper articles about the astronauts and the shuttles, weather reports on launch scrubs, and stories about her idol, Judith Resnik. Then, on the morning of January 28, 1986, seventy-three seconds after liftoff, the space shuttle Challenger explodes, killing all seven astronauts on board -- including Judith Resnik. It is a moment that shakes America to its core, and nowhere is it more deeply felt than in central Florida. Dolores becomes determined to reconstruct what went wrong, both in her parent's marriage and at NASA, in the hope that she can save her father's job and keep her family together. The Time It Takes to Fall is a coming-of-age novel that deftly weaves the story of one family's drama into the larger picture of a touchstone event in American history. It is at once an intimate look at a young girl's loss of innocence and a portrait of America's loss of innocence -- the end of an era that romanticized manned space flight and would never be the same again.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Young Adult, Coming Of Age, Book Club, Space, Novels

336 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2007

About the author

Margaret Lazarus Dean grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota, and received a BA in anthropology from Wellesley College and an MFA from the University of Michigan. She is currently a lecturer at the University of Michigan and lives in Ann Arbor.

Reviews

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Upon further reflection, I'm changing my rating from four stars to five.

I think in many ways coming-of-age stories retell the loss-of-innocence story most familiar to me in the story of the Garden of Eden. "The Fall" is hauntingly repeated with several characters, including NASA and the shuttle Challenger. It is the painful crash at the end of the fall where lessons are learned, and that may be Dean's point all along.

Dean's ability to inhabit the mind of a 13-year-old girl, and narrate both personal and (inter)national events through that lens is remarkable. It speaks to an authentic honing of craft more than the vague memories of personal experience, I think, and I look forward to future works, if only to see if that skill translates to other narrators.

[Chris Blocker · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this novel. Once I was into the story, I found myself staying up late to read “just one more chapter” (or two or three). Nothing extraordinarily exciting happens in these pages, but I was pulled in as if a great reveal awaited me in the next chapter. Craft-wise, The Time It Takes to Fall is more of a four-star novel, but I think the fact it kept me so captivated should count for something.

The Time It Takes to Fall is the story of a girl, Dolores, who yearns to be an astronaut. Her father is a technician at NASA and her mother is slowly unraveling. Against a backdrop of a budding shuttle program and the Challenger disaster, Dolores comes of age in ways that are achingly familiar at times, unrealistically extreme at others. I liked her character and her relationship with others. She is intelligent and insightful, and though she's not always personable, her attitude seems age appropriate and does not make her any less enjoyable to be around. Some of Dolores actions may have gone further than I imagine a thirteen-year-old in her position would go, but given her family situation, her aspirations, and the current events, these actions are not completely outside possibility.

For the most part, The Time It Takes to Fall is written in the voice of a normal thirteen-year-old girl. Her view can at times be juvenile. But Dolores isn't your average thirteen-year-old. She has her childish moments, but she is often rather insightful in a believable way. Her love of physics and the space program really come out in these pages and highlight the novel's strongest moments. Of the many historical world-changing events (e.g. revolutions, genocides, natural disasters), the Challenger explosion of 1986 is, in hindsight, fairly insignificant. Yet, for whatever reason, it shook the nation in a way that rivaled presidential assassinations and surprise attacks. And it seemed to resonate most strongly with those who were children in the 1980s. By giving us this brilliant yet formative protagonist, Dean has really captured the sentiment of the event. Further, Dean has really stepped out and shown her bravery. It is not easy to tackle such a significant event that is dear to many people. And it's certainly not easy to portray the inner-workings of the massive organization at its heart, finger-pointing and all.

Five stars: for bravery, significant research, well-crafted characters, and a story that kept me up at night and taught me a few things.

[L. Farmer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wrote this novel with Margaret Lazarus Dean. I worked with Gabrielle Giffords at The Print Shop of Savannah in the early 90's. Gabrielle married Mark Kelly, brother of Scott Kelly, the Kelly boys (who both worked for NASA) went to William Henry Shaw HS in 1982. I enjoyed writing with Margaret.

[Perryville Library · Rating 4 out of 5]

Astronauts have been in the news quite a bit lately, though not for the usual reasons. So was it just an eerie coincidence that debut novelist Margaret Lazarus Dean’s space-centered first novel, The Time it Takes to Fall, was released just a day after an astronaut and Navy captain was infamously arrested for attempted kidnapping in Florida?

Dean’s coming-of-age tale is set during the days before and after the Challenger disaster and deals more in social history than scandal. Through her endearing pre-teen protagonist Dolores Gray, Dean crafts a portrait of life in a Florida town overshadowed by nearby Cape Canaveral. Dolores is a precocious 12-year old math prodigy whose father, like many fathers in her town, is a NASA technician. She herself has dreams of someday going into space like her idol, astronaut Judith Resnik. She not only keeps a scrapbook of articles associated with space program, but is quite well-versed in the language of rocket boosters—no doubt a product of her close relationship with her father who regularly takes Dolores to early morning launches. When Dolores’ father is laid off, the Gray family begins to disintegrate. Her mother returns to work, but eventually leaves the family while her father struggles with unemployment and the task of raising two young girls. Dolores herself begins to founder as she enters high school (a year early) and is exposed to the usual bevy of adolescent influences—smoking, popularity, and dating. What results is a striking parallel between the 1986 Challenger explosion and Dolores’ own shattered family life.

Dean’s research into rocket science, NASA history, and the Challenger disaster is not only extensive, but presented in such a way that readers can easily understand the scientific terminology and the significance of the events leading up to the disaster. Ultimately, Dean presents some revealing insights into the specifics of the explosion that are conveyed in the epilogue—a reconstruction of the last few minutes of the lives of the crew members.

What can readers expect from Dean’s next novel? The writer gives little away, though she does confirm that she’ll be returning to the subject of disaster. What kind, she doesn’t yet know, but in an interview on her website (www.margaretlazarusdean.com) she explains, “I’m fascinated by the way disasters both change us and reveal who we were to begin with.”

[Kristen · Rating 5 out of 5]

i realize i never wrote anything about this book!

i really enjoyed this one. i liked the cover, skimmed the jacket, decided it sounded interesting (though not my usual subject matter) and decided that it was a library book - it's worth a shot!

well, this was a gem! i loved the story. i adore coming of age stories so i was pleasantly surprised with the main character and her struggles as she grows up.

i even enjoyed the bits about physics and the very detailed descriptions of the shuttles - not my normal thing - but it was well written and really didn't detract from the story in this book.

the last 3 pages of this book are haunting. it deserves 5 stars for that alone.

[Celeste Ng]

This book was beautiful. Though there were places where I wanted more, or wished loose ends were tied up more tightly, I found myself thinking about it long after I'd finished reading--which to me is one of the signs of a good book. And the last section, where the author imagines what the final moments of the Challenger astronauts might have been like, is absolutely breathtaking.

[Catherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story had some relevance to me coincidentally as we used to live in Florida and had visited the Cape Canaveral space station, which is well worth a visit. This is a coming-of-age story set against events with the space shuttles and a mother who is going through some difficult times. She takes off and has an affair and leaves her dear daughter to do a lot of growing up on her own.

[Barb · Rating 4 out of 5]

hard to decide 3 or 4 stars, but delores stayed with me. so 4! the story is like none i have read, told by the teen-aged daughter of a NASA worker responsible for the infamous O ring on the Challenger. a little uneven at times, esp with boy/girl relationship, but a good thoughtful read. apparently, the challenger tragedy is for her generation what the kennedy assassination is for mine.

[Alexis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a heavy read, but compelling and endearing. The Challenger explosion is one of those moments I will never forget, so this fictional account, chock full of hard facts, thrilled me.

[Amanda Carver · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book gets exactly right so much about being a thirteen year old girl, AND I NEVER FEEL THAT WAY.

[Ava Butzu · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I belonged to a signed first editions club, "The Time It Takes to Fall" was a selection in 2007. I'm not sure why it took me a dozen years to read it, but it stayed on my short shelf of books to read for the entire time - and I'm so glad it did. Though it was a quiet and slow-to-develop, "The Time It Takes to Fall" ached with longing and loss and was wrought with the importance felt only by a young teenager discovering the complexities of growing up.

Dolores Gray is 13 the year that the Space Shuttle challenger - the mission that carried the first teacher in space, Christa McAuliff, exploded as it lifted off into space. Set near the Kennedy Space Center, Dolores' life revolves around space travel: her father is a technician who works on the shuttles at NASA, and Dolores obsessively reads and collects all information that she can about all space missions. She is gifted in math and physics and is determined to be an astronaut one day.

That age - 13 - is fraught with potential for Dolores to rise in the world - and potential to fall. With Dolores transitioning from childishness to maturity, desperate to be popular and loved, her family life falls into turbulence and confusion. When her father is laid off and her mother takes on a secretarial job, Dolores abandons her allegiances and betrays those who love her most. Such topsy-turvy themes pervade the narrative. As Dolores becomes jaded and dives into adult behaviors, her little sister, Delia, becomes a mirror for the loss of hope and innocence. This sibling relationship was, perhaps, the most meaningful to me, perhaps because it became the most meaningful to Dolores.

"The Time It Takes to Fall" is a wonderful, subtle, resonant story - a memorable first novel by a talented writer.

[Kristi Schoonover · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was a teen who was about the same age as this narrator at the time of the CHALLENGER disaster. Although the book's Cape Canaveral setting is closer to the accident's ground zero and therefore the experience has a milieu that's a little more intense for our narrator, Dean's rendering of the reaction of the narrator's schoolmates, friends, and world in general is spot on. She has nailed the post-explosion rumors, even the jokes. Those who didn't live through this event can get a 3-D glimpse into not only what happened, but how it felt for those of us who watched. The 1980s teen culture is organic and real, not forced or "researched." But what's truly stunning about this book is how the narrator's very voice and character changes as she grows: she becomes more cynical and adult before our very eyes. High recommend.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too well written for 2.5 stars, but I'm too disappointed to give it three. I loved the premise: I was the exact same age as the main character when the Challenger exploded, and was excited to read a coming-of-age tale about a young girl who wanted to become an astronaut. The parts of this book that focused on the space program were my favorites, but I found I could not connect at all with the main character. Her questionable choices and motivations were unclear and seemed random, keeping her at arm's length from the reader. I'm all for unlikable characters; I just found her one-dimensional and opaque. There was little-to-no character growth throughout. The chilling epilogue is what I will remember most about this book.

[Stephanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was on track to be four stars because of the nostalgia related to the Challenger explosion and the way the author gave face to the people who worked at NASA. However, it is a pet peeve of mine when coming of age stories think that loss of innocence has to mean loss of virginity, even when, in this case, the main character was only 13 years old.

[Elizabeth Marion · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one is literally my all time FAVORITE book. It hiches a young girl’s coming of age tale to a NASA solid rocket booster for a metaphorical ride that is out of this world. Finely written, carefully plotted and well-executed... A deft reflection on the loss of national and personal innocence that skillfully explores a series of events rarely addressed in fine adult fiction.

[Catherine · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting topic, but there is not one likable or unselfish character. I hated the mother and found her incredibly selfish. Dolores was awful as well. I didn't see any growth in the characters. They were just awful all the way through.

[Keith Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

First novel that sticks in my mind -- because it directed adolescent desire so poignantly toward the Challenger disaster. It was a very accomplished first book.

Here's something I wrote back in the day:

https://annarborobserver.com/articles...

[Carmen · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Lynsi Latham-Saunders · Rating 3 out of 5]

teenage anxt in a community of NASA space employees. The central character working out really matters - family friends loyalty

[Molly · Rating 3 out of 5]

When I finally got into this book, I consumed it heartily and yet, there was reason for the great hesitation. First, Myla Goldberg is a hard act to follow and as I had just finished "Bee Season," Margaret Lazarus Dean had some big shoes to hop into. The other objection to immersing myself in Dean's novel is the unmet expectations of the book's purpose. I had seen Dean read some months back and was moved by her premise that her generation (which happens to be my generation) is heavily influenced by the fact that our greatest tragedy was the Challenger Explosion disaster in 1986. While this is rightly called a tragedy and a great loss for both the families of those who died and to the direction of the Space Program, Dean suggests an innocence to a generation who falls between the Greatest Generation and the current one who lives under the real fear of a post-911 world.

At her reading, Dean read the last three pages of her novel, which may seem like an odd choice, but which is easily the best three pages of the book and which does not give away the narrative of the coming-of-age story before it. The last three pages are incredibly moving as Dean considers what it means for healthy men and women to have fallen two minutes and 45 seconds to their death, believing all the while that there was no way they would die. How could healthy people in the prime of their lives believe in their own imminent death? It is too impossible a possibility. Her imagining of the event is gorgeous and heartbreaking and SOME of the rest of her novel is as well, but finally, it felt more like a grown-up version of a Judy Blume novel - charming, moving, emotional, but not in any way life altering.

Ultimately, the Challenger Explosion backdrop felt more incidental and I wanted more. I expected more. The central character's story of growing up with a father who was responsible for the O-rings that were determined to responsible for the tragic explosion was interesting enough, but again, the O-ring seemed incidental and took too far a backseat to the central character's precocious sexual awakening and the other antics and shenanigans she gets into in the high school life of a young Floridian in the eighties.

[Adrian · Rating 3 out of 5]

I both hated and mildly liked this book. I both recommend and don't recommend others read this. In other words: approach at your own risk.

The parts about the space shuttle program were interesting and the parts about Challenger in specific were fascinating to me. I grew up knowing the shuttle exploded (I was maybe 3 when it happened) and never really knew the whys and hows of it. I looked up some of the details after finishing and it was mostly all correct in the book, with maybe some dramatic embellishes.

The part where this book flounders for me is characterization, character interactions and realism. Those are three very important aspects of a novel!

So again: approach at your own risk.

[Stephanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first novel of author Margaret Lazarus Dean, The Time It Takes to Fall tells a coming-of-age story amid chronicles of the 1980s NASA manned space program. The novel focuses on a young teenage girl, Dolores, growing up along Florida's space coast in a town largely employed by and directly connected to the Kennedy Space Center. Dean gives Dolores an almost unnatural interest in NASA, particularly the new space shuttle program and the introduction of women in space. Dolores idolizes one female astronaut in particular, Judith Resnik, and secretly vows one day to become an astronaut herself. While planning for her future, however, Dolores realizes that her family is subtly coming apart itself, a fact she initially ignores in favor of new space shuttle developments and launches. January 28, 1986 thus proves to be a day of great awakening for her, both in her family life and personal NASA pursuits as she must struggle to accept and understand not only the fallibility of her NASA dreams, but also the disintegration of her family in light of the highs and lows that accompany being so closely tied to the shuttle program. This novel provides an interesting prospective from which to view NASA’s ideals and errors in the early space shuttle program as it intertwines the lives of Dolores’s friends and family. Parts of this book, particularly towards the end, signal that it is a first novel: an unaccountably rapid push to a conclusion after extensive development toward the shuttle explosion, as well as a slightly questionable if not anachronistic epilogue; nonetheless, the NASA trivia alone—epilogue included—can be thought-provoking as Dean introduces two uniquely human perspectives on a program that is often viewed solely through socio-political lenses.

[Katie Mulry · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I was a little kid, my dad took me to Half Price Books and bought me a biography on Neil Armstrong. I decided that when I grew up, I wanted to be an astronaut, and one summer, I went to a week-long day summer camp to learn about space. When I walked in, there was a large diagram of the solar system on the floor, and I jumped from planet to planet, dreaming of flying past them one day.
And then I learned of the Challenger explosion, which had happened long before I was born. Suddenly, space seemed dangerous, terrifying. So much could go wrong. And I decided that I didn't want to be an astronaut after all.
This book was beautiful and amazing, and it reminded me of being a little kid, of watching the stars and wanting to fly among them and eating astronaut food and loving it. I loved everything about this book from the cover and title to the end.
The characters were amazingly flawed. The writing was absolutely beautiful. The story progressed at the perfect speed in the perfect way, and everything that happened had a purpose. I could so clearly see Dolores and her dreams, her space journal, the way she grew up, the loss of innocence. I understood her, even though she embarrassed me a lot throughout the book, and she was amazing. This book inspired me to learn and made me think, and I definitely recommend it, because The Time it Takes to Fall is a beautiful, amazing book that deserves to be read, for the kid in all of us that still dreams of space.

[Monica · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are certain moments in American history which define a generation. One such moment occurred in January 1986, as much of America watched live as the space shuttle Challenger launched from Florida. A mere 73 seconds after liftoff, the unthinkable happened and the shuttle exploded in front of a stunned nation. The Time it Takes to Fall chronicles the coming-of-age story of young Dolores Gray juxtaposed against the backdrop of the trials and tribulations of the NASA space program in the 1980's. The story begins in 1984 and 11 year old Dolores dreams of becoming an astronaut like her idol, Judith Resnik. She's a faithful follower of each launch from nearby Kennedy Space Center where her father works as booster technician. When her father is laid off, however, her family quietly disintegrates. Now forced with increasing responsibilities at home, her life quickly spirals out of control. Coupled with the loss of her first love and the Challenger Disaster, Dolores struggles to find her identity in this new, disillusioned world.

[Oolookitty · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a terrific book. Dolores is one of the most realistic teens in recent fiction, and her relationship with couldbe best friend Eric, which is affected by Dolores' need to be accepted by the snobbish kids at school, rings terribly true. Her complex relationship with her mother is also very nicely handled. The backdrop of Florida before and after the space shuttle disaster is fascinating and feels painstakingly researched. Dean manages to give the reader lots of background on the space shuttle program without making her prose feel teacherish; we learn about it as Dolores does, and her "space notebook" is a good device for adding that historical detail to the story. Tension definitely mounts as we approach the space shuttle disaster, and it's handled effectively and with great feeling, rather than being exploitative in any way.

I read A LOT, and this book stood out as one of the best things I've read in a while -- it's good enough that I was inspired to fire off an email to the author, something I've never done before.

Keep it up, Ms. Dean -- what a wonderful read.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I was in the middle of reading this I saw a quote from an author (can't remember who) that said "coming of age" stories generally must be set against a historical background in order to be successful. That is exactly what Dean has done here, chronicling Delores's life between the ages of 11 and 13 as she grows up on Florida's Space Coast. Her father works for NASA and is intimately involved in the shuttle program - the book outlines Delores's love for the program (and her father) right up through the time of the Challenger explosion.

This was a decent book, but, despite the fact that I was about Delores's age at the time of accident, I couldn't really relate. Several of the characters take actions or have motives that make little sense to me - why did the mother leave? Why did Delores come to hate her father? Why in the WORLD did Delores make the phone call she did?

Overall, OK, but probably nothing I would recommend. The most interesting part was learning the astronauts survived the explosion?! I had no idea! .

[Booker · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are certain events that people of a certain generation remember where they were or what they were doing. One of those for Generation X is the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. Margaret Lazarus Dean's fiction portrayal caputures it perfectly. It has just enough historical and cultural references to keep the reader in tune with what was going on at that time, but without dating itself. This is truly the mark of a fine writer. On the one hand, her talent reminds me of Laura Moriarity's, another fine writer. On the other, I think of how O'Brien's books and Tree of Smoke represent Vietnam, Barthelme's Waveland and Brinkley's The Great Deluge represent Katrina, a score of books on 9/11, and Dean's The Time It Takes to Fall, the Shuttle program, NASA, and America's complicated history with space exploration and the nuclear family.

[Mardel Fehrenbach · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good coming of age novel. I liked the way it blended in the facts about the space program and the Challenger disaster with the fictional story in a way that does not seem particularly dated. The book also made me rethink those events and the impact they might have had on a different generation, one who was younger than I when the Challenger exploded. The characters are well realized and I think in many ways the mixture of elements work well to describe this girl and the way she is trying to find her way from youth to adulthood. The middle section of the book becomes rather formulaic and I found it difficult to plow through this part, although the first half of the book was excellent, and the story redeems itself at the end. Very good. I would like to read more from this author.

[Kristi Schoonover · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was a teen who was about the same age as this narrator at the time of the CHALLENGER disaster. Although the book's Cape Canaveral setting is closer to the accident's ground zero and therefore the experience has a milieu that's a little more intense for our narrator, Dean's rendering of the reaction of the narrator's schoolmates, friends, and world in general is spot on. She has nailed the post-explosion rumors, even the jokes. Those who didn't live through this event can get a 3-D glimpse into not only what happened, but how it felt for those of us who watched. The 1980s teen culture is organic and real, not forced or "researched." But what's truly stunning about this book is how the narrator's very voice and character changes as she grows: she becomes more cynical and adult before our very eyes. High recommend.

[Careyleah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was so surprised to be strongly drawn into a book about the Kennedy Space Center! And of course, it is about so much more. Generally, coming of age books don't interest me much because they are often not well done, but this one met a high standard. As 'D' made decisions, I would find myself holding my breath (both as a former 13 year old AND as a mother!!)--No, don't do that! Or, yes, open your mouth and say something!

'D's' relationships with her younger sister, her mother and her father are complex as she makes her way into adolescence. Her emotional pain is palpable, and feel like skin shedding.

I like the book. Read it.