"What news have you?"
"It is as we expected, General. It seems we were correct all the time. There is no question but that the American cosmonaut is experiencing serious difficulties."

Major Dick Pruett has lost count of how many orbits his capsule has made. It doesn't really matter now. He will only go down in history as the astronaut who didn't come home. His retrorockets failed and, even powered down into 'chimp mode', he doesn't have enough oxygen to last until his orbit decays naturally. NASA has given him some cock-eyed plan to shoot a Gemini up as a lifeboat but, who are they kidding, that bird ain't nowhere near ready to fly. But Dick swears he can see a capsule outside his window and that sucker was definitely not made in the USA.

In his book, Live from Cape Canaveral, Jay Barbree names Marooned as the impetus behind the Apollo-Soyuz program. First published in 1964, just after the conclusion of the Mercury program, it was very timely. A film of the book followed in 1969, four months after Apollo 11.

Caidin's aeronautic expertise really comes through, there are many technical passages and jargon sprinkled throughout. I found Pruett's background story captivating but I did find myself skimming some passages on the Vostok just to get back to the story. And I can see how the story, especially when it was first published, would have started some really interesting conversations. Could one spacecraft overtake another? And what would the Russians have with a highly knowledgeable astronaut?

Marooned really puts me back in the Space Race mindset and I enjoyed it. ( )