Spaceflight, 2nd Edition: The Complete Story from Sputnik to Curiousity

This is an excellent encyclopedic book on the history as well as current state of space travel from the earliest rockets through future space colonization. It is profusely illustrated with many large detailed drawings and photographs, as well as 3D cutaways of space ships, space stations, and rockets. Anyone who has any interest in space travel and exploration will enjoy this book. This second edition is an updated version of the first edition but in many respects contains the same pages for many entries without change (presumably because historically nothing had changed between the first and second editions for such coverage). But the new second edition is smaller in size than the first and all photographs and illustrations are likewise downsized from the first edition, albeit not by that much. The first edition dimensions are 10.3 x 1 x 12.1 inches while the second edition is 9.7 x 1 x 11.4 inches. The second edition is still a large book though. I plan to keep both in my library because I personally like the larger illustrations and photos of the first edition (but that's just me). Both editions have the same page length of 320 pages, despite what the product details for the first edition on the Amazon page for that edition states (ie, 360 pages).

Lots of information and great pictures. Grandson loved it and read from cover to cover! Loves to tell me all about what he has learned!!!!!

It is a tech keepsake. It has important photos. It includes photos and information of the Soviet (and other countries) space program(s).

This a wonderful book with unbiased account of the dramatic space race between USA and Soviet Union.

Over, this is a great book with excellent visuals and pretty good text (could have used more written text), but left out what I believe is a huge contributor to spaceflight. That would be ULA (United Launch Alliance).

Beautiful book. I bought one for my niece after receiving mine. Lots of illustrations. Great add to my library.

Great book on the history of manned space flight. Beautifully illustrated and organized.

This is a beautiful book about space and its history.