Atmosphere: A Love Story

Joan Goodwin has always been at home among the stars. When NASA opens its astronaut programme to women, she applies - and finds a family, a purpose, and a love she never planned for.

Publisher's blurb

Synopsis

Reid moves from rock stars and film icons to the early-1980s shuttle programme, following a physics professor selected into a training class where the women are simultaneously the story and the problem. The novel alternates between the grind of training and a mission gone wrong in December 1984, and it treats both the science and the closeted love story at its centre with unusual patience.

The editorial feature

The Reid formula - glamorous milieu, retrospective structure, one devastating withheld fact - applied to a setting where the stakes are literal. The technical detail is confident enough to persuade, and the final fifty pages are among the most propulsive she has written. A love story that earns its title twice over.

Book details

Genre

Historical Fiction

Released

3 June 2025

Publisher

Ballantine Books

Featured on

3 June 2025

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