Nonfiction: The Six: The Untold Story of America's First Women Astronauts

Full Title: The Six: The Untold Story of America's First Women Astronauts by Loren Grush

When NASA sent astronauts to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s, the agency excluded women from the corps, arguing that only military test pilots—a group then made up exclusively of men—had the right stuff. Eventually NASA recognized its blunder and opened the application process to a wider array of hopefuls, regardless of race or gender. From a candidate pool of 8,000 six elite women were selected in 1978—Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Anna Fisher, Kathy Sullivan, Shannon Lucid, and Rhea Seddon.
Greeted in Houston by make-up bags designed for use in space, no designated locker rooms and flight suits that didn't fit, they went on to break barriers on earth and in space.
Journalist Loren Grush reveals their journey through NASA's outreach program, enduring claustrophobic—and sometimes deeply sexist—media attention, undergoing rigorous survival training, and preparing for years to take multi-million-dollar payloads into orbit. Together, the Six helped build the tools that made the space program run.