Packing for Mars by Mary Roach

The Curious Science of Life in the Void

Packing for Mars = Book #3 for my new Nonfiction Book Club! One of the members, not me, is super into books about space and Antarctica so our May read and July reads have been picked by her. And while I am a person who is often freaked out and overwhelmed by the vast void of space, I, surprisingly, wasn’t too freaked out by Packing for Mars.

---

Synopsis

From the Back Cover:
The best-selling author of Stiff and Bonk explores the irresistibly strange universe of space travel and life without gravity. From the Space Shuttle training toilet to a crash test of NASA’s new space capsule, Mary Roach takes us on a surreally entertaining trip into the science of life in space and space on Earth.

---

Review

Admittedly, I’ve started reading/listening to 3 Mary Roach books prior to starting this one. And while I’ve enjoyed them all, for some reason I put each one down without coming back to it after reading about 50%. Bonk, Stiff, Gulp, each one fascinating, but I certainly haven’t finished them. And I really couldn’t put my finger on why until Packing for Mars.

Mary Roach has a near insatiable curiosity – she could probably ask questions endlessly. I thought I was curious, but she far surpasses my natural inclination to learn about the same topic for any significant amount of time. By the halfway mark, my curiosity regarding her chosen subject is pretty much fulfilled. However, because of her curiosity, I see her fulfilling a unique role to the film industry.

NASA has actual space travel mechanics to figure out – I trust the astrophysicists to figure out how we’re actually going to move off Earth and survive, though I hope this doesn’t have to happen until after my lifetime. But science fiction film and books don’t always have a direct link to the scientists of NASA – enter Mary Roach! If the filmmakers of The Martian didn’t take a look at Packing for Mars or any other additional source material for actually living on Mars, I’d be surprised.

With the ever increasing temperatures on earth, as well as other troubles, it’s no surprise off-world action adventure movies have become more and more popular. Originally I thought Packing for Mars would make the great basis for a movie, but I’ve now realized it can serve as a popular science companion to The Martian, Passengers, and a whole host of other off-world science fiction adventures.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars

---