NASA's First Space Shuttle Astronaut Selection

David Shayler has been writing books for Springer-Praxis for over 18 years, with a total of 25 authored or coauthored titles for the series. These have ranged from various aspects of American and Russian manned spaceflight history and operations to topics on women in space, the human exploration of Mars and the development of EVA techniques and operations. He has a passion for recording the lives and careers of the world's space explorers. He has been a member of the British Interplanetary Society for over 40 years and currently is a serving Council Member. He also organized and hosted the annual Sino-Chinese Technical Forum and is currently organizing two extra Forums for next year on the topic of Space Rescue and Safety and 20 years of ISS Operations. Dave is a guest editor of the annual BIS JBIS Space Chronicle issue on Sino and Chinese Technical Forums and has contributed to a number of BIS Publications. His work has been published in the UK in Spaceflight , and Spaceflight News , and in the United States under Macmillan's Who's Who in Space trilogy as well as the Magill Science Survey and the MPress Secrets of the Universe Card Collection. A number of his titles and published articles have been referenced in other books, journals and official NASA publications. Colin Burgess's early books were on the Australian prisoner-of-war experience, before he turned his efforts to writing about his principal interest: human space exploration. Colin has written a number of books on the subject for the University of Nebraska Press and Springer-Praxis. The books he has written or coauthored for Springer-Praxis are "NASA's Scientist-Astronauts," "Animals in Space," "The First Soviet Cosmonaut Team," "Selecting the Mercury Seven," "Moon Bound," "Freedom 7," "Liberty Bell 7" "Friendship 7" and "Aurora 7." More recently, he has written about the Interkosmos program and a history of NASA's Group 5 and 7 astronauts with coauthor David Shayler.

Authors' Preface.- Acknowledgements.- Foreword.- Dedication.- List of Abbreviations and acronyms.- Prologue.- Chapter 1: Expanding 'The Right Stuff'.- Chapter 2: Who could fly?.- Chapter 3: The new pilot astronauts.- Chapter 4: The first Mission Specialists.- Chapter 5: All Change in the Astronaut Office.- Chapter 6: Ascan pioneers.- Chapter 7: Silver Pin astronauts.- Chapter 8: Preparing to fly.- Chapter 9: NASA's All-Electric Flying Machine.- Chapter 10: The TFNG take wings.- Chapter 11: "Go at throttle up".- Chapter 12: The final missions.- Chapter 13: Flying a desk.- Chapter 14: Reflections.- Chapter 15: The legacy.- Afterword.- Appendices.- Bibliography.- About the authors.- Other works by the authors.- Index.

"We are presented with an in-depth history of the 35 brave, clever, and dedicated people who initially flew the Space Shuttle. The book does much more than concentrate on their successes. ... What I specially liked about this book was its emphasis on intricacy and detail. The stories were well told, well-illustrated, well referenced, and never dull." (David W. Hughes, The Observatory, Issue 141, June, 2021)

"It is an inspiring read for those with an interest in the shuttle era, which the authors describe in human, as well as technical terms. The photo of Ron McNair, who made it from segregated South Carolina via MIT to playing the saxophone on board Challenger on STS-41B, shows that the Right Stuff has indeed been redefined." (Andy Sinharay, Aerospace, March, 2022)