The Apollo Murders: 1

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The designated Apollo 18 astronauts are Tom Hoffman, Luke Hemming, and Michael Esdale, and the benign goal is for Tom and Luke to walk on the Moon and collect samples while Michael pilots the lunar orbiter. The writing was 100% to blame. The author simply didn't have the storytelling skills yet to make a story like this work. It was full of conveniences, constant head-hopping, useless characters, annoying stereotypes, unnecessary detail, inconsistent pacing, bizarre character motivations, bland dialogue, too many subplots, no character development, and boring prose. It's no surprise an editor couldn't save this amateur attempt at a novel.

And this has all the bones of a great thriller. The premise is fantastic, the setting atmospheric, and who doesn't love a deadly cat-and-mouse game playing out in space? Since this is fiction weaved into real history, I recognized a lot of the people and events of the space program, and it adds to the authenticity of the whole thing. It was also interesting to contemplate how the Cold War mentality of suspicion and secrecy would play out should the U.S. and Russia actually cross paths during the space race. An exceptional debut thriller and "exciting journey" into the dark heart of the space race from New York Times bestselling author and astronaut Chris Hadfield (Andy Weir, author of The Martian and Project Hail Mary).Stars. I’m a huge fan of Chris Hadfield. He’s awesome! He’s one of our own! I’m sure every Canadian knows who he is. This amazing Canadian connected with us through social media and introduced the entire world to outer space.

In reality, the last manned mission to the moon was America’s Apollo 17, but the jumping off point for this story is that there was actually an Apollo 18 done as a secret military operation. How do you keep a space mission involving thousands of people a secret?A nail-biting Cold War thriller set against the desperate Apollo mission that never really happened…or did it? It's a very rare book that combines so many things I love, from taut suspense and highly realistic action, to the golden age of space exploration. I couldn't put it down." - James Cameron, Academy Award-winning writer and director of Avatar and Titanic