Leaving Orbit: Notes From the Last Days of American Spaceflight by Margaret Lazarus Dean

That spaceflight sendoff on the cover is now a thing of the past as the American space program has been slowly dismantled and is now a shadow of its former glory days. As she asks the question: “What does it mean that we won’t be going into space anymore,” space junkie Margaret Lazarus Dean counts down the last days of the shuttle program and describes them with bittersweet emotions. The somewhat narrow perspective, limited to fellow enthusiasts at Cape Canaveral, leaves you wanting more at times, yet Dean’s enthusiasm — mixed in with equal part outrage — ultimately shines through.