I've always been fascinated by space and hearing stories from someone who's been there is just amazing. It is so refreshing to read about Hadfield's lifelong dedication and commitment to achieve his boyhood aspirations. I think perhaps the book and the Colonel himself would have been better served if he had an editor sit down with him and encourage him to tease out more meat to the story.

To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Outside the window, then, what you see is Earth, tumbling over and over, which is hard to look at when your stomach is unsettled. This is a completely fascinating life story told in such an engaging way that it becomes a gift for one’s own life!Astronauts are not just expected to respond positively to criticism, but to go one step further and draw attention to their missteps and miscalculations. Trainers in the space program specialize in devising bad-news scenarios for astronauts to act out, over and over again, in increasingly elaborate simulations.

In An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth, Chris gives us a rare insider’s perspective on just what that kind of thinking involves, and how earthbound humans can use it to achieve success and happiness in their lives. It felt like I was reading the same thing over and over again, I spent the whole time wishing there would be a climax but there never was one. He speaks humbly to an almost infuriating degree - at times I found myself wishing he'd get on with acknowledging how awesome at everything he had to be to end up where he did.

He helped create and host the National Geographic miniseries One Strange Rock, with Will Smith, and has a MasterClass on exploration. With burning curiosity, I had to check out the YouTube videos of his life on the International Space Station, and they're fascinating. But his vivid and refreshing insights in this book will teach you how to think like an astronaut, and will change, completely, the way you view life on Earth – especially your own.

Endings don’t have to be emotionally wrenching if you believe you did a good job and you’re prepared to let go. Hadfield was an incredibly successful fighter pilot and then test pilot, with a degree in mathematical engineering, before being considered for astronaut training. Even the simplest quotidian activities like eating and drinking, going to the toilet, brushing your teeth, exercising and sleeping needed to be considered carefully.There was a lot of explanation of the crafts and procedures they do while on board, but it was actually fascinating rather than laborious to read about. The book does not deserve a 3, but it is not quite a 4 and I am ever so glad to have read this but I am left wishing there was more. It's the story of my life, really: trying to figure out how to get when I want to go when just getting out the door seems impossible. But at some point, they just have to accept the people in their crew, stop wishing they were flying with Neil Armstrong, and start figuring out how their crewmates’ strengths and weaknesses mesh with their own.

Without gravity, heat doesn’t rise, so air doesn’t mix and move; the fans and pumps that are necessary for comfort and survival whir, clunk and hum, a continuous blur of sound that’s occasionally punctuated by the loud ping or bang of a micrometeorite hitting the Station. Hadfield takes readers deep into his years of training and space exploration to show how to make the impossible possible. This would have done his story far more justice, rather than deliver what feels like a rush job to simply capitalize on his Rock Star status. You might never be able to build a robot, pilot a spacecraft, make a music video or perform basic surgery in zero gravity like Col. We had shed calcium and minerals in space, so our bones were weaker; so were our muscles, because for 22 hours a day, they’d encountered no resistance whatsoever.And it’s easy to do once you understand that you have a vested interest in your co-workers’ success. Once in my pajamas (Russian-made, long john-esque) I zipped myself into my hooded sleeping bag, which resembles a cocoon with armholes. Every decision you make, from what you eat to what you do with your time tonight, turns you into who you are tomorrow, and the day after that. Hadfield proves himself to be not only a fierce explorer of the universe, but also a deeply thoughtful explorer of the human condition. In his book, An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth, Chris Hadfield takes listeners deep into his years of training and space exploration to show how to make the impossible possible.