Professor Astro Cat's Space Rockets

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Greetings, fellow space travellers! Have you ever wondered how a rocket works? Do you dream of becoming an astronaut? Then come along as we find out all the exciting ways we can reach space. Get ready for blastoff!Professor Astro Cat's latest adventure leads young readers through the wonders of space travel. Easy-to-understand facts and descriptions introduce rockets, astronauts, satellites and the space station, all married with beautiful and informative illustrations.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Kirkus Book Review

The bubble-helmeted feline explains what rockets do and the role they have played in sending people (and animals) into space.Addressing a somewhat younger audience than in previous outings (Professor Astro Cat's Frontiers of Space, 2013, etc.), Astro Cat dispenses with all but a light shower of "factoroids" to describe how rockets work. A highly selective "History of Space Travel" followsbeginning with a crew of fruit flies sent aloft in 1947, later the dog Laika (her dismal fate left unmentioned), and the human Yuri Gagarin. Then it's on to Apollo 11 in 1969; the space shuttles Discovery, Columbia, and Challenger (the fates of the latter two likewise elided); the promise of NASA's next-gen Orion and the Space Launch System; and finally vague closing references to other rockets in the works for local tourism and, eventually, interstellar travel. In the illustrations the spacesuited professor, joined by a mouse and cat in similar dress, do little except float in space and point at things. Still, the art has a stylish retro look, and portraits of Sally Ride and Guion Bluford diversify an otherwise all-white, all-male astronaut corps posing heroically or riding blocky, geometric spacecraft across starry reaches.Energetic enough to carry younger rocketeers off the launch pad if not into a very high orbit. (glossary) (Informational picture book. 6-8) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.