How We Got to the Moon: 3, 2, 1...Liftoff!

In How We Got to the Moon, written and illustrated by John Rocco, the reader is transported to another era.  A time when the impossible became a reality through the hard work of over 400, 000 people.

I think people, including myself, have taken for granted what went into getting to the moon.   Rocco starts from the beginning of the space face with the launch of Sputnik.  What follows are the important people, their ideas, and the establishment of NASA as the foundation of our country's space program. 

Told through beautifully drawn illustrations, text boxes abound this book that feature specific people, women, problems and solutions, as well as diagrams and quotes of those who were working on this complex task.

Growing up with an aerospace engineer as a father, I appreciated all things associated with flight.  I enjoyed the astronaut ice cream, was in awe of the space suit displayed at the Smithsonian and sorrowfully remember the Challenger explosion when I was in elementary school.  This book put all of those memories into context and connected them into the story that takes the reader all the way to the moon.

Even though I knew that the launch would be successful, I still held my breath as Rocco broke down each part of the process, humanizing it and laying the groundwork for today's technological advances.   Saying this is just a STEM book is an understatement.  It is a book for anyone who is infatuated by flight.  Young readers can learn much from the graphics and older readers will learn even more from reading about the journey from start to finish.