Russians in Space

by Evgeny Riabchikov, Nikolai P. Kamanin (Editor), Guy Daniels (Translator)

This book gives Western readers their first inside look at the Soviet Union's vast space program. The men, the rockets, the flights-and the scientists behind them.

Genres: Nonfiction, Space, History

388 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1971

Reviews

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

For those who followed the Russian Space Program this was the first book, published in the US, that gave a close up look at the early days. It is very much a PR piece, presenting the Russian program as something out of a 19th century Russian Novel. One where everyone is happy, recites poetry, and boldly goes into space for Mother Russia. One doesn't read about the Chief Designer's prison term, or the explosion at the launch site. Read this, then go read Jim Oberg's "Red Star in Orbit". Red Star will fill in all the gaps.

[Warren Dunn · Rating 3 out of 5]

As far as space program books go, this was very thorough. It detailed the lives of all the Soviet cosmonauts in the first ten years of manned spaceflight, including the early ideas of space travel from philosophers, early rocketry, and Korolev’s drive to get into space. It’s a great reference book. But it’s heavily politicized around the Soviet Union. It gets tiring reading everybody’s title, and it seems like they’ve all been Heroes of the Soviet Republic even before joining the cosmonaut program. The narrative makes me wonder how much of the conversations reported were recorded or if most of them were made up with the “sense” of what the author remembered. Overall, the book was dull in parts, but well written through most of it.