What kicked off this idea was that I started reading James R Hansen's "First Man" the authorised biography of Neil Armstrong while I was building the Lunar Module. I did wonder if I was going to make it through as I found the early chapters about the family history heavy going, but the book found its legs when Armstrong began his flying career and has been very entertaining from then onwards (I've got as far as the moon landing to date).
Other books I'd recommend are "Moon Shot" by Alan Shepard & Deke Slayton, and "Lost Moon" by Jim Lovell which was the source to the Apollo 13 movie. Both are very well written and fascinating insights into the NASA space program.
I've still got "The Last man on the moon" by Gene Cernan and "Moonfire" by Normal Mailer on my reading pile (my book stash is about as big as my kit stash).
The only one I've given up on is Gene Kranz's "Failure is not an Option". I will go back and give this another try at some point because as far as I'm concerned this man is as much an icon/legend of the missions as any of the astronauts - unfortunately he's not a writer and the book isn't well written or edited which is a real shame.
Movie/TV wise I love "Apollo 13" and am always impressed by the sense of suspense they managed to achieve during the re-entry even for those of us that knew the outcome. "In the Shadow of the moon" is also an enjoyable/informative watch as is HBO's "From the Earth to the Moon" mini-series.
I hope that's of interest to some folks and if anything else comes to mind I'll add it here, but looking forward to seeing what others have read/watched that I can add to my pile.
