Orbit image
Orbit Nance, John J. Edition: 2006 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Number of Pages: 275 ISBN10: 0743250524 ISBN13: 9780743250528 Dimensions: 6.75" w x 9.50" l x 1.25" h Weight: 1.19 lbs. Binding: Trade Cloth Language: English

Description

The bestselling author of "Pandora's Clock" returns with a riveting thriller set in the world of commercial spaceflight. The year is 2009, and when a micrometeorite punches through the wall of a just-launched spacecraft, killing the pilot, passenger Kip Dawson discovers he is truly alone.Chapter 1 F IVE MILES SOUTH OF M OJAVE, C ALIFORNIA, M AY 16, 9:23 P.M. P ACIFIC For Kip Dawson,...The bestselling author of "Pandora's Clock" returns with a riveting thriller set in the world of commercial spaceflight. The year is 2009, and when a micrometeorite punches through the wall of a just-launched spacecraft, killing the pilot, passenger Kip Dawson discovers he is truly alone.Chapter 1 F IVE MILES SOUTH OF M OJAVE, C ALIFORNIA, M AY 16, 9:23 P.M. P ACIFIC For Kip Dawson, the risks associated with being shot into space in a few hours are finally beginning to seem real. Am I really going to do this? he thinks, braking the SUV hard, foot shaking, as he casts his eyes up to take in the stark blackness of his destination, amazingly visible through the windshield. This last evening on earth -- the very eve of his windfall trip into space -- feels too surreal to grasp emotionally. He's sure of only one thing: At long last, it's scaring as much as exciting him. He winces at the irritated blast of a trucker's horn and pulls to the side of the highway, letting the big rig roar past before climbing out to stare into deep space. He's oblivious to the sharp chill of the desert night, but aware of the double white flash of the beacon at Edwards Air Force Base a few miles to the east. To the west, the barest remains of ruddy orange undulate on the horizon, a razor-thin band along the crest of it, whispering a vestigial message from the sunset. But it's the deep velvet black of the cloudless night sky that's entrancing him, and he hasn't seen the Milky Way so startlingly clear since he was little. The highway beside him is quiet again, but the sky is full of silently twinkling strobe lights from the arriving and departing airliners frequenting LAX, a kinetic urgency energizing the lower altitudes above him. He feels like a child as he contemplates the vastness of all that void. Provided there's no explosion on the way up, he'll be there in person in a few hours, encapsulated in a tiny, fragile craft, closer -- even if only incrementally -- to all those stars. There is no productivity in stargazing, the dutiful part of his mind is grousing, but he suppresses the growing urge to leave. The air is quiet and perfectly still, and he hears the song of a nightbird somewhere distant. A moment earlier a coyote had made his presence known, and he hears the animal call again, the howl almost mystical. How small we are, he thinks, as he stands beneath the staggering scope of a billion suns strewn at least ten thousand light-years across from horizon to horizon, trying to embrace it -- even the largest of his personal problems seeming trivial by contrast. There's a barely remembered quote . . . perhaps something Carl Sagan once said: "Even though earth-bound and finite, the same human mind that can declare the cosmos too vast to physically navigate can at the same moment traverse its greatest distances with but a single thought." His cell phone rings again, the third time in an hour, but he tunes it out, thinking instead about the details of ASA's space school he's attended for the previous two weeks and the awe he still feels when he sees the famous Apollo 8 picture of the Earth rising over the lunar landscape. Everything in perspective. It's the way he's been told every NASA astronaut feels when the sound and fury and adrenaline of reaching orbit subsides -- three g's of acceleration end abruptly -- and it's finally time to be weightless and breathe and look outside. He recalls the video of sunrise from space, the colors progressing through the rainbow to the sudden explosion of light over the rim of the planet, all of it proceeding at seventeen times the speed of dawn on the ground -- where the Earth's surface turning velocity is less than a thousand miles per hour. He'll see four sequences of that during the flight. An incongruous desire for coffee suddenly crosses his mind, and he realizes he's longing as much for the tangible feel of something earthly and familiar as the drink itself. But he has a responsibility to achieve the sleep that coffee won't bring. MorThe New York Times bestselling author and "king of the modern-day aviation thriller" (Publishers Weekly) boldly goes where the imagination fears to tread . . . The year is 2009. For Kip Dawson, winning a passenger seat on one of American Space Adventure's commercial spaceflights is a dream come true. One grand shot of insanity and he can return to earth fulfilled. It's a bittersweet moment of triumph, however, muted by his wife's terror over his accepting the prize. The day of the launch, Kip tries to reconcile his wife's and daughters' fears and even tries calling his estranged son, to no avail. He sets off, vowing to make amends upon his return. But a successful launch quickly morphs into chaos when a micrometeor punches through the wall of the spacecraft, leaving the radios as dead as the pilot. In the blink of an eye, Kip Dawson is truly alone and has no way of navigating the ship home. With nothing to do but wait for death, Kip writes his epitaph on the ship's laptop computer, unaware that an audience of millions has discovered it and is tracking his every word on the Internet. As a massive struggle gets under way to rescue him, Kip has no idea that the world can hear his cries -- or that his heroism in the face of death may sabotage his best chance of survival.The year is 2009. For Kip Dawson, winning a passenger seat on American Space Adventure's spacecraft is a dream come true. One grand shot of insanity and he can return to earth fulfilled. But the thrill of the successful launch turns to terror when a micrometeorite penetrates the capsule, leaving the radios as dead as the pilot. Reality hits: Kip isn't going home. With nothing to do but wait for his doomed fate, Kip writes his epitaph on the ship's laptop computer, unaware that an audience of millions has discovered it and is tracking his every word on the Internet. As a massive struggle gets underway to rescue him, Kip has no idea that the world can hear his cries -- or that his heroism in the face of death may sabotage his best chance of survival.A passenger on a 2009 space flight, Kip Dawson faces death after a micrometeorite damages the capsule and kills the pilot. Kip then logs his epitaph on the ship's computer, unaware that his writings are being read on the Internet by a horrified public.New York Times bestselling author John Nance soars with more cutting-edge thrills in an unforgettable page-turner set at the frontier of commercial space flight. (more) (less)

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