SPACEMAN

Very few jerks have ever been to space, says veteran astronaut Michael Massimino. Why and how this is, it could be argued, is the subject of his remarkable memoir. As a man who clung to a childhood dream, despite countless rejections along the way that threatened to keep him from joining NASA, Massimino made it into one of the most elite clubs in the world--those who have left the planet and lived to tell about it. Massimino's story is a classic, his voice that of a natural raconteur, and his insight into the space program singular. All this from a six-foot-three kid from Long Island who was afraid of heights.