Go Play In Space, Second Edition

Just a note to say that the revised and expanded version of Go Play In Space was released on May 4 when Orbiter 2006 was released. As I've mentioned in other recent posts, I've been working on this for a while, with help from new co-author Andy McSorley who provided a great tutorial chapter on using IMFD to go from Earth to Mars. I also added a new chapter on rendezvous and docking, updated the chapter on add-ons, added an appendix on how to use the new Scenario Editor, and upgraded everything for the 2006 version, including new screen shots. It was a lot of work but I was happy to fix up some things that bothered me about the first edition, and to add some new material.

This free ebook is suitable for ages 12 and up, though most emails I have gotten about the first edition were from much older "space kids" - so maybe I should say for kids of all ages. If you have an interest in space flight but don't know much about it, this book will lead you through the basics fairly painlessly (though I can't deny that there's a lot of detail to follow and learn). Even if you know quite a bit about space flight and Orbiter, you may find something of interest in the hands-on tutorial chapters or in the various background chapters. The new edition is 181 pages - lest this scare you away, note that the flight tutorial chapters are 14-22 pages each, and there is a 1-2 page checklist summary at the end of each flight chapter for quick reference while flying (the exception is Andy's Mars chapter, which is more of a checklist style anyway and doesn't have the summary checklist at the end).

One thing that's great with Orbiter 2006 is that I was able to provide annotated tutorial flight recordings for some of the chapters (chapter 2 intro mission, chapter 4 Moon flight, and chapter 5 rendezvous/dock). These are included with Orbiter and can show you visually how it's done. Like seeing the movie before reading the book (sort of).