Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void

by Mary Roach

Overview

The best-selling author of Stiff and Bonk explores the irresistibly strange universe of space travel and life without gravity.

Space is a world devoid of the things we need to live and thrive: air, gravity, hot showers, fresh produce, privacy, beer. Space exploration is in some ways an exploration of what it means to be human. How much can a person give up? How much weirdness can they take? What happens to you when you can’t walk for a year? have sex? smell flowers? What happens if you vomit in your helmet during a space walk? Is it possible for the human body to survive a bailout at 17,000 miles per hour? To answer these questions, space agencies set up all manner of quizzical and startlingly bizarre space simulations. As Mary Roach discovers, it’s possible to preview space without ever leaving Earth. From the space shuttle training toilet to a crash test of NASA’s new space capsule (cadaver filling in for astronaut), Roach takes us on a surreally entertaining trip into the science of life in space and space on Earth.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781324036050
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	10/04/2022
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	47,045
Product dimensions:	8.10(w) x 5.40(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Mary Roach is the author of five best-selling works of nonfiction, including Grunt, Stiff, and, most recently, Fuzz. Her writing has appeared in National Geographic and the New York Times Magazine, among other publications. She lives in Oakland, California.

Hometown:

San Francisco, California

Place of Birth:

New Hampshire

Education:

B.A., Wesleyan University, 1981

Website:

http://www.maryroach.net/

Table of Contents

Countdown 15

1 He's Smart But His Birds are Sloppy 21

Japan Picks an Astronaut

2 Life in a Box 41

The Perilous Psychology of Isolation and Confinement

3 Star Crazy 63

Can Space Blow Your Mind?

4 You Go First 79

The Alarming Prospect of Life Without Gravity

5 Unstowed 95

Escaping Gravity on Board NASA's C-9

6 Throwing up and Down 107

The Astronaut's Secret Misery

7 The Cadaver in the Space Capsule 129

NASA Visits the Crash Test Lab

8 One Furry Step for Mankind 149

The Strange Careers of Ham and Enos

9 Next Gas: 200,000 Miles 173

Planning a Moon Expedition Is Tough, but Not as Tough as Planning a Simulated One

10 Houston, We have a Fungus 191

Space Hygiene and the Men Who Stopped Bathing for Science

11 The Horizontal Stuff 209

What If You Never Got Out of Bed?

12 The Three-Dolphin Club 229

Mating Without Gravity

13 Withering Heights 247

Bailing Out from Space

14 Separation Anxiety 265

The Continuing Saga of Zero-Gravity Elimination

15 Discomfort Food 285

When Veterinarians Make Dinner, and Other Tales of Woe from Aerospace Test Kitchens

16 Eating Your Pants 307

Is Mars Worth It?

Acknowledgments 319

Timeline 323

Bibliography 325

Editorial Reviews

Roach is America's funniest science writer…in Packing for Mars, she has written a comic survey of space science, with emphasis on the absurd, the bizarre and the gross…Obviously, Roach is not afraid of the icky. In fact, her book is packed with the kind of delightfully disgusting details that brings joy to the hearts of 12-year-old boys—and to the 12-year-old boy that lurks inside the average adult male.
—The Washington Post

Peter Carlson

Anyone who thinks astronauts ply a glamorous trade would do well to read Mary Roach's Packing for Mars. The book is an often hilarious, sometimes queasy-making catalog of the strange stuff devised to permit people to survive in an environment for which their bodies are stupendously unsuited…With an unflinching eye for repellent details, she launches readers into the thick of spaceflight's grossest engineering challenges: disposing of human waste, controlling body odor without washing, and containing nausea…
—The New York Times Book Review

M. G. Lord

Ms. Roach has already written zealously nosy books about corpses (Stiff), copulation (Bonk) and charlatans (Spook). Each time, what has interested her most is the fringe material: exotic footnotes, smart one-liners, bizarre quasi-scientific phenomena. Yet her fluffily lightweight style is at its most substantial—and most hilarious—in the zero-gravity realm that Packing for Mars explores. Here's why: The topic of astronauts' bodily functions provides as good an excuse to ask rude questions as you'll find on this planet or any other…So Packing for Mars is as startling as it is funny, even if its strategic aim is to tell you more than you need to know.
—The New York Times

Janet Maslin

Roach (Stiff) once again proves herself the ideal guide to a parallel universe. Despite all the high-tech science that has resulted in space shuttles and moonwalks, the most crippling hurdles of cosmic travel are our most primordial human qualities: eating, going to the bathroom, having sex and bathing, and not dying in reentry. Readers learn that throwing up in a space helmet could be life-threatening, that Japanese astronaut candidates must fold a thousand origami paper cranes to test perseverance and attention to detail, and that cadavers are gaining popularity over crash dummies when studying landings. Roach's humor and determined curiosity keep the journey lively, and her profiles of former astronauts are especially telling. However, larger questions about the "worth" or potential benefits of space travel remain ostensibly unasked, effectively rendering these wild and well-researched facts to the status of trivia. Previously, Roach engaged in topics everyone could relate to. Unlike having sex or being dead, though, space travel pertains only to a few, leaving the rest of us unsure what it all amounts to. Still, the chance to float in zero gravity, even if only vicariously, can be surprising in what it reveals about us.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Publishers Weekly

"Over the course of several frank chapters, Roach explores the nitty-gritty details of life in space that filmmakers and historians tend to gloss over…Roach’s wide-eyed wonder…sets Packing for Mars apart from the galaxy of space travel histories"

Boston Globe

"Roach deftly guides her readers…They never completely lose sight of the accomplishments of space travel, even as they take delight in the absurdities that, in the end, make those successes all the more sublime."

Dallas Morning News

"[Her] style is at its most substantial—and most hilarious—in the zero-gravity realm that Packing for Mars explores.… As startling as it is funny."

The New York Times - Janet Maslin

"Cool answers to questions about the void you didn’t even know you had."

People

"An impish and adventurous writer with a gleefully inquisitive mind and stand-up comic’s timing."

Booklist

"An utterly fascinating account, made all the more entertaining by the author’s ever-amused tone."

BookPage

"[Roach] has once again discovered a winner of a subject…Roach’s strange enthusiasm for all things oddball…makes Mars a more than worthy destination."

Time

"The book is an often hilarious, sometimes queasy-making catalog of the strange stuff devised to permit people to survive in an environment for which their bodies are stupendously unsuited. With an unflinching eye, [Roach] launches readers into the thick of spaceflight’s grossest engineering challenges."

New York Times Book Review - M. G. Lord

"Hilarious."

The New York Times Book Review

"Roach provides a highly readable, often hilarious, guide."

Christian Science Monitor

"A more realistic view of life in space than we have ever gotten from a NASA broadcast."

The Daily Beast

"Truly funny…Roach’s writing is supremely accessible, but there’s never a moment when you aren’t aware of how much research she’s done into unexplored reaches of space travel."

Entertainment Weekly

"It’s all about those things NASA doesn’t delve into at press conferences."

BoingBoing

"The author’s writing comes across as reportorial, but with a clear sense of humor; even the footnotes are used to both informational and comedic effect."

Time Out New York

"This is the kind of smart, smirky stuff that Roach does so well."

San Francisco Chronicle - Geoff Nicholson

"[Roach] has once again discovered a winner of a subject…Roach’s strange enthusiasm for all things oddball…makes Mars a more than worthy destination."

Time

Popular science writer Mary Roach answers the questions of what it takes to send the human body into outer space—and how much normalcy can be given up in the process to survive there. Her no-holds-barred and lighthearted approach to the serious and mundane aspects of astronaut life makes this well-researched popular science work a hilarious, albeit occasionally gross, read as the ever-curious author delves into the immense efforts it takes to keep people healthy and happy in space.

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Library Journal

Bestselling author Mary Roach writes anecdotal humor; she’s sort of a female alternative to Bill Bryson (only younger). Here she offers her quirky view of the tribulations experienced by astronauts—specifically, details not often reported by the general media. For example, how do astronauts deal with body odor, feces, urine, and sex? Narrator Sandra Burr enhances the subjects with her obvious enthusiasm, at one point even proffering her version of gagging and vomiting—with gusto. She speaks with a Middle American accent and often sounds as if she is smiling, which she probably is. Beyond that, however, there is little opportunity for histrionics, this being, ultimately, a book of well-researched, though quirky, facts. D.R.W. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

AUGUST 2010 - AudioFile