Stories From Space

Conversation about the incredible missions that are changing our view of the Cosmos, including New Horizons' mission to pluto, curiosity Mars Rover and our newest adventure, the  recently launched James Webb Telescope. 

Nancy Atkinson is the Author of Incredible Stories from Space and Eight Years To The Moon, editor and writer for Universe Today, a popular space and astronomy site, and is a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador. She has written thousands of articles, writing daily since 2004 about the latest news about space. She was the editor in chief for Space Lifestyle Magazine and also has had articles published on Wired.com, Space.com, NASA’s Astrobiology Magazine, Space Times magazine and several newspapers in the Midwest. She has been involved with several space-related podcasts, including Astronomy Cast, 365 Days of Astronomy and was the host of the NASA Lunar Science Institute podcast. Nancy lives in Minnesota.

Incredible Stories From Space

Ride along on the journeys in the midst of an amazing era of discovery through the immense and magnificent universe with Nancy Atkinson, editor of Universe Today.

In Incredible Stories From Space, Nancy takes readers inside the unmanned missions – the rovers, orbiters and telescopes -- that are transforming our understanding of the solar system and beyond. With one-on-one interviews with over 35 NASA scientists and engineers, as well as detailed information on the missions and their scientific discoveries, this book tells the stories of the spacecraft and the people behind the missions, and describes the journeys both have taken to make the discoveries and breakthroughs that are showing us the amazing, breathtaking Universe in which we live. From the first-ever mission to Pluto to hunting for planets outside our Solar System, readers will journey along with missions like New Horizons, the Curiosity Mars rover, and the iconic Hubble Space Telescope as they unlock the mysteries of the cosmos. Incredible Stories From Space will take readers through the latest findings in our Solar System with the Cassini mission to Saturn, Dawn’s visit to the asteroid belt, the Solar Dynamics Observatory, and both the Lunar and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter missions. Take a look at the future of space exploration, with a preview of upcoming missions.

Eight Years To THE MOON

In Eight Years to the Moon, unique personal stories of NASA engineers and MIT computer experts are interwoven with Nancy’s gripping style to tell the story of Apollo 11 in a fresh and riveting way. Despite incredible hurdles and catastrophes, the employees of NASA made the impossible possible—creating new technology and completely reimagining space travel. Nancy begins in 1962—when NASA had to build the Manned Spacecraft Center and space exploration first became a priority—and spans to the successful Apollo 11 mission. With firsthand accounts from Henry Pohl (director of engineering at Johnson Space Center), Glynn Lunney (Apollo flight director), and Frank Hughes (lead test engineer for the Apollo command and lunar module simulators), it’s easy to get wrapped up in the excitement of what it was like. In the words of Henry Pohl when he saw his first rocket test launch, “When that thing lit off I had never seen such power in my life…I decided right then and there that’s what I wanted to be part of…” And he was far from alone. Filled with stories from those involved and interviews with other Apollo experts, this is a book that will delight anyone who has ever looked up at the moon and wondered how we got there.