What's Next? discussion

"Why would you do this? Trying to live where you can never thrive? Trying to go where the universe doesn’t want you when there’s a perfectly good earth just there that does."

This is a book about many things, but mainly about humanity through the daily lives of 6 astronauts on a mission aboard the International Space Station, their histories, and their interactions with each other. It is beautifully written, especially the detailed descriptions of the optical views of our planet Earth from space and its landscapes day through night. The sometimes excessive illustrations of a place or a point can be powerful but also exhausting.

It is shortlisted for this year's Booker Prize.

"Humankind is a band of sailors, ... a brotherhood of sailors out on the oceans. Humankind is not this nation or that, it is all together, always together come what may."

Thanks. Re the Booker short list, I've read James and was interested in "Stone Yard Devotional" but will check this out.

Winner 2024 Booker prize.

“Raw space is a panther, feral and primal; they dream it stalking theough their quarters.”

“They’re humans with a godly view and that’s the blessing and also the curse.”

Earth as seen from the international space station told through the eyes (and point of view) of 6 astronauts aboard, including their perspective on the moon landing happening in parallel. The book covers one day in the life, which spans 16 sunrises and sunsets.

Beautifully written but more poetry than work of fiction with the Earth as the main character.

Themes include
- Earth, beautiful, in motion, and in climate crisis.
- Life in space. Challenge of perspective, sense of time and weightlessness.
- Man’s insignificance in the universe but also what man has achieved and destroyed with his ambition.

3.5 rounded up.