One of the books I’ve always known about, read bits of over the years, but never knuckled down and read cover-to-cover. In the 80s it was turned into the wonderful movie we know with Dennis Quaid, Sam Shepherd, Ed Harris, and many more future A-list movie stars.
I’ve read a few books about the space programme over the years; perhaps the best being “First Man” - a fascinating biography of Neil Armstrong.
“The Right Stuff” is different - it’s nota dry re-telling of history - it’s a gently dramatised account of 16 years, painting the characters of the test pilots, and the first astronauts through their family stories, the Life Magazine journalists, and huge swathes of Normal Mailer style deep digging into what it might mean to become an Astronaut.
Beyond the stories of rocket planes, accidents, test pilots, and life in the high desert of the mid-western US, a few surprising stories come out;
Who knew that the Mercury astronauts were incredibly badly paid? If they had to travel too much in a given week to industry junkets supporting the rocket programme, it invariably meant their family had no money for groceries
Who knew that Life Magazine (who had exclusive access to the astronauts and their families) created the heros we know - carefully ignoring anything and everything that might devalue their perceived image.