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Title	:	Rocket Boys (Coalwood #1)
Author	:	Homer Hickam
Book Format	:	Paperback
Book Edition	:	Deluxe Edition
Pages	:	Pages: 384 pages
Published	:	January 11th 2000 by Delta (first published 1998)
Categories	:	Nonfiction. Autobiography. Memoir. Biography. Science. History

Rocket Boys (Coalwood #1)

Homer Hickam

Paperback | Pages: 384 pages

Rating: 4.21 | 16153 Users | 1812 Reviews

Explanation During Books Rocket Boys (Coalwood #1)

"Until I began to build and launch rockets, I didn't know my home town was at war with itself over its children, and that my parents were locked in a kind of bloodless combat over how my brother and I would live our lives. I didn't know that if a girl broke your heart, another girl, virtuous at least in spirit, could mend it on the same night. And I didn't know that the enthalpy decrease in a converging passage could be transformed into jet kinetic energy if a divergent passage was added. The other boys discovered their own truths when we built our rockets, but those were mine."

So begins Homer "Sonny" Hickam Jr.'s extraordinary memoir of life in Coalwood, West Virginia - a hard-scrabble little mining company town where the only things that mattered were coal mining and high school football and where the future was regarded with more fear than hope.

Looking back after a distinguished NASA career, Hickam shares the story of his youth, taking readers into the life of the little mining town of Coalwood and the boys who would come to embody its dreams.

In 1957 a young man watched the Soviet satellite Sputnik shoot across the Appalachian sky and soon found his future in the stars. 'Sonny' and a handful of his friends, Roy Lee Cook, Sherman O'Dell and Quentin Wilson were inspired to start designing and launching the home-made rockets that would change their lives forever.

Step by step, with the help (and occasional hindrance) of a collection of unforgettable characters, the boys learn not only how to turn scrap into sophisticated rockets that fly miles into the sky, but how to sustain their dreams as they dared to imagine a life beyond its borders in a town that the postwar boom was passing by.

A powerful story of growing up and of getting out, of a mother's love and a father's fears, Homer Hickam's memoir Rocket Boys proves, like Angela's Ashes and Russell Baker's Growing Up before it, that the right storyteller and the right story can touch readers' hearts and enchant their souls.

A uniquely endearing book with universal themes of class, family, coming of age, and the thrill of discovery, Homer Hickam's Rocket Boys is evocative, vivid storytelling at its most magical.

In 1999, Rocket Boys was made into a Hollywood movie named October Sky starring Chris Cooper, Jake Gyllenhaal and Laura Dern. October Sky is an anagram of Rocket Boys. It is also used in a period radio broadcast describing Sputnik 1 as it crossed the 'October sky'. Homer Hickam stated that "Universal Studios marketing people got involved and they just had to change the title because, according to their research, women over thirty would never see a movie titled Rocket Boys" so Universal Pictures changed the title to be more inviting to a wider audience. The book was later re-released with the name October Sky in order to capitalize on interest in the movie.

Define Books Conducive To Rocket Boys (Coalwood #1)

Original Title:	Rocket Boys
ISBN:	0385333218 (ISBN13: 9780385333214)
Edition Language:	English
Series:	Coalwood #1
Setting:	West Virginia(United States)
Literary Awards:	National Book Critics Circle Award Nominee for Biography/Autobiography (1998), Weatherford Award (1998), Alabama Author Award for Nonfiction (2001)

Rating Out Of Books Rocket Boys (Coalwood #1)

Ratings: 4.21 From 16153 Users | 1812 Reviews

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Noticed that one of my Goodread friends is reading this and realized I had never posted it on my list. One of the best I have read largely because I enjoy coming of age stories and really identify with the time period.

If you love to read about someones life that is really boring, the person is lame and very selfish. There are tons of science related things(that the normal person doesn't care about) and it's story line needs to be flushed down the toilet. And it would have been slightly decent if there was romance. (I know that there was a little bit, but it was only four lines and no detail so I didn't count it.) So if you are some one who likes those kind of books then you are going to love "October Sky."

I just spent the last 3 days in Coalwood, WV, and would have stayed longer, but turned the last page of this wonderful book. What a great story of growing up, coping with difficulties, ambition, family disappointments, friends, teachers; in short, the things that made Homer Hickam, Jr. the man he is today.There was a lot of nostalgia in this book for me. I grew up in Catsburg, NC, a tobacco farming community instead of a coal mining town. It was a time when we children pretty much ran free

A great story. I personally liked all of the information is spewed at me, much like in Dan Browns Da Vinci Code, except for this taught me about physics and rocket building instead of art history. Though I liked it for this reason even though physics isnt... my preferred science please know whether or not you like it in books because it may turn people away.What brought it down to four stars was that this book, along with many others written about or in this time period, had little character



Such a wonderful story. I loved how in real life Homers dad championed his rocket building in his own way, unlike portrayed in the movie. And his Mom, what a courageous lady helping her son become a man. It was especially fun to read this book after being in the mountains that Homer loves. And visiting Marshall Space Center where he worked during his NASA years.

Homer Hickam recounts how he and his classmates, inspired by the launch of Sputnick, taught themselves (with a little help from some key adults) how to build rockets in the late 1950s. Hickam proves himself a more than capable storyteller, mixing equal parts nostalgia, humor, and teenage angst as he tells his story, including a warts-and-all look at his hometown and the coal company which gave it life. The result is a finely crafted tale of heartbreak and consternation, despair and, ultimately,