[.ca] Apollo EECOM: Journey of a Lifetime: Apogee Books Space ... (ISBN 1896522963)

The CD is Amazing:
This book is interesting, and a noble effort for a first time author. I have always been fascinated by the Apollo program, and have always found the mission control team interesting. (I highly recommend 'Failure is not an Option' by Gene Kranz.) When I heard that Sy Liebergot had written a book, I pre-ordered it. I generally found the book interesting but not as focused on the Apollo program, NASA or the EECOM job as the title would imply. I am amazed by the hardships that Sy overcame and my hat is off to him for that, I just wish that his first book had focused more on Apollo and EECOM duties (after all, the title is 'Apollo EECOM') and less on his personal tribulations. There is one incredibly redeeming feature of the book, though, and it is the enclosed CD, which is a series of recordings of the EECOM loop during the Apollo 13 near disaster as well as some Apollo 15 audio and a spoof song for the post Apollo 13 party. Overall, a good book, but the CD alone is worth the cost!

Insightful insiders look inside the Apollo program:
Mr. Leibergot's book reads a little like a family alblum, complete with anecdotes, tales of troubled youth, and group snapshots at various parties. Much of the Apollo story has been told elsewhere, but this version is more personal than most. What really makes this book worth the price of admission is the included CD. The extended recording of the Apollo 13 incident reveals the tension of the event and the unbelievable professionalism of the controllers who brought it to a safe conclusion. I always thought that Sy was portrayed as somewhat incompetent in other versions of the episode. This book and CD set the record straight.

Disappointed:
Much of the book (up to page 80) discusses the authors upbringing, family, military experience, and high diving. I find this material irrelevant. This is one of those books you wouldn't give a 2nd look at the bookstore, but it looks good on Amazon. I'm returning it.

An essential Apollo Book:
There are a handful of books that are essential to understanding of how the successes of Apollo were achieved and about the people who made it happen. This is one of those books. "Apollo EECOM" is far more personal than most and is an easy, engrossing read. Above all, I appreciate Liebergot's honesty. Highly Recommended.

A great, personal insight.:
This book isn't one of those thick, literary historical tomes that we have seen a good many of in the last few years from former NASA managers. Rather, this feels like you have been personally invited into Sy's living room to sit on the sofa and look over his memorabilia while he tells you about it over your shoulder. It's a surprisingly frank and honest look at his life. Rather than trying to build himself up to be an historical figure, he pulls no punches with an account of a difficult, scrappy early life where he had to learn to survive his family, then work out how to leave and make something of himself. He tells this compelling story so well that I would have read it even if he had not gone on to join NASA - something I also felt when reading Scott Carpenter's account of his difficult upbringing in his recent memoir. When Liebergot moves on to his years at NASA, we get a refreshingly different account of how things worked there. Most other books on this era have been written by those in the upper echelons of management, but Liebergot here shows us what it was like for the footsoldier in the trenches, with a few little accounts of tempers lost in mission control and other disagreements that the official histories try and gloss over. Rather than do this as a tell-all, Liebergot includes his own failings in the mix - he doesn't hide the fact that he is now on his third marriage, nor the reasons. Liebergot was there for some of NASA's finest undertakings, and this book tells you what it was like from a human perspective - the weariness, the shortcomings, the oversights - that round out the picture very well. In short, this is not a polished history of NASA at its finest hour. Rather it is a very loose, informal journey through one man's difficult life, and how he managed to wash up in the right place at the right time.