One Small Step

I can only give the highest of praises to this outstanding young adult adventure book that could only be destined for a movie and possible Newberry Award. This incredible story packs it in with nonstop riveting pages not allowing the reader to put it down for one second. The reader will experience the whole gambit of action, adventure, science, faith, trust, love, friendship, betrayal, humor, sadness, life, and death. I found myself cheering, frightened, laughing, crying. Our young hero Scott Macleod, a feisty 13 year old flying spitfire, is one hell of a kid and fearless hero you will simply never forget. To get into any description of what the story entails, I believe will totally ruin it for others so I think readers should trust and have faith that this is Kerr's best yet and one should just up and go buy it! The author's Children of the Lamp books are good, and his adult books are too, but this is just the best yet! I cant see how any reader of any age would find disappointment in this novel for boys and men ages 10-100. When I turned the last page I felt like standing up and clapping.

While I am not the intended audience for this book, I enjoyed it. My 12 year old received this book as a birthday gift. I have always been a fan of the space program, plus we really like the "Children of the Lamp" books written by the author. The author did a wonderful job using historically accurate facts to build this fictional story. As someone who always wondered what it would be like to be an astronaut, it was easy to get caught up in the story. I only give the book four stars because towards the end of the book, the story takes a very bizarre turn. The main character, Scott, who confesses earlier in the book to not really believe in God, has what could be describe as a "conversation" with a higher power. Is it a hallucination, aliens or God? It wasn't necessarily the questioning of God's existents that turned me off, but I found this section rambling and just plain odd. Some parents might find this "conversation" and Scott's lack of faith objectionable. Also, Scott and his friend look at his Dad's "Playboy Magazines" (with minor comments about such) and make typical 13 yr old boy comments about girls, etc. I would personally not let a child younger then 12 read this book and you still might find yourself explaining a few things. All in all, a good book. I will wait a year or so for my son to read it though. He'll enjoy the book more when he is in that 13 yr old boy just starting to really like girls and becoming independent state of mind.

Scott MacLeod is about to become the youngest astronaut in NASA, only no one is supposed to know about it. His mission is a secret one that not even NASA will talk about or the other astronauts know about. It all started when Scott's dad, who is an Air Force pilot, started teaching Scott to fly. Scott is only twelve, so when he is able to crash land an Air Force plane, one he shouldn't have even known how to fly, NASA takes notice. NASA is trying to land a man on the moon, but many things could go wrong and there are still lots of questions that need to be answered before that ambition can really take off. So, before the real astronauts left on the Apollo missions, NASA had been sending secret test missions into space. These missions, which used chimps as astronauts, were called Caliban. When the chimp pilot for the latest Caliban mission goes crazy, NASA recruits Scott to fly the shuttle. The shuttles are made smaller, so who better to pilot them than a twelve-year-old boy? But, NASA has secrets about the training of the chimps and Scott isn't sure he can go along with the mission as planned. Several times during the reading of this book, I had to remind myself that this was fiction and not a true story. There is a lot of adventure, from Scott's Air Force flying to the space program. There is a lot of technical jargon as well, dealing with Scott's training and then his mission in space, which might turn off some readers. If you're a fan of space exploration this book provides an interesting perspective on the 1960's space race. Reviewed by: Sarah Bean the Green Bean Teen Queen