My favourite part-besides the NASA history that is explored-was the way the story tackled social media and the power of altered perception one has when living “online”. Fans of anything relating to NASA or space will devour this book, I am sure of it. While reading The Gravity of Us, though, I found myself immersed in the lives of the astronauts and the strain that this profession puts on their loved ones, not knowing whether they’d see their spouse or parent again once they’d go up in that rocket left me reeling.
Prior to reading The Gravity of Us, the only encounters I’d had with anything concerning astrophysics or space were TV shows and an ex-boyfriend who could not get me interested despite studying aerodynamics at university for four years. It takes a special sort of author to make a topic you have absolutely no knowledge of suddenly become the center of your universe as you read a book and Stamper surely delivers on this front. While against all odds, Cal continues his social updates and suddenly brings a whole lot more interest and demand to NASA and its mission, not to mention more than their reality show ever did, the traditional StarWatch reality TV show and the ‘new media’ Cal brings to the table go head to head, and the results aren’t pretty for anyone involved. Uprooted from his life in Brooklyn and his raising stardom as a self-made journalist on the FlashFame app, Cal finds himself in Texas, now one of the “Astrokids” and under strict instruction to cease all social media posts and stories-a real blow for someone who has spent the last few years building a portfolio as one of the most honest, no-bullshit political news reporters who just so happens to have scored an internship with Buzzfeed. The Gravity of Us follows young Calvin, a promising journalist who is just about to finish high school when his father, a pilot, gets picked to fill the remaining spot for an upcoming NASA mission to Mars that takes Cal’s plans for the future and turns them upside down.
The Gravity of Us was one of my most anticipated reads of 2020 and with a gorgeous cover, an OwnVoices queer romance, and a promising new author, this ticked all of my boxes.
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