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Overview
The Sun swings behind the world. Night engulfs him. The dull metal craft plunges through space, its portholes pale beacons containing the silhouette of a man, and the only other lights are the stars themselves.
Can one act define a man? Or his country? Ascent is the spellbinding thriller by critically acclaimed British novelist Jed Mercurio. Inspired by the secrets still surrounding the USSR's race against the United States to put a man on the moon, Mercurio asks the chilling question, What if the Americans weren't first?
Ascent takes us on the perilous journey of its singular hero, the brave and determined Yefgenii Yeremin. Yefgenii rises from the privation of a Stalingrad orphanage in 1946 to the heights of the cosmonaut corps. During the Korean War he joins an elite Soviet squadron conducting a secret air war against the famous aces of the U.S. Air Force. Dubbed Ivan the Terrible, he amasses more jet kills than any fighter pilot in history, but his feats must remain unknown to his countrymen, his victories un-celebrated. After the war, his achievements are scrubbed from the records and he is exiled to a base above the Arctic Circle, where he flies patrols on the edge of American airspace. There he learns that Yuri Gagarin has become the first man in space, the greatest of all heroes.
And then, as America's Apollo astronauts prepare to reach the Moon, he is given a new name and sent into cosmonaut training. Throughout his career, he has craved a place in history, in the climactic clash between the two great powers. At last his country calls him. And somewhere between the Earth and the Moon, Ivan the Terrible finds his mission to create history, to exceed his own life.
With one of the most fascinating heroes in recent fiction, Ascent builds a terrifying scenario within the shadowy history of the space race. Haunting, tragic, boldly inventive, Ascent is a tour de force of imagination.
* Mp3 CD Format *. Fascinated with the secrets still surrounding the Soviet Union's race against the Americans to put a man on the Moon, Jed Mercurio proposes a compelling scenario: What if the Americans weren't the first? And with its inscrutable but intriguing hero, Yefgeni Yeremin, a brilliant Soviet cosmonaut, "Ascent" allows us to imagine what that terrifying journey might have been like.Yeremin, a Soviet MiG pilot, rises from the privation of a Stalingrad orphanage to the heights of the cosmonaut corps. During the Korean War, as a member of an elite squadron, he shoots down the most American fighter jets-a feat that should make him a national hero, but because the Soviets' involvement in the war is secret, Yeremin's victories go unreported. When he is recalled from obscurity to join the race to the Moon, he realizes it is his chance for immortality. In hypnotic, deceptively spare prose, Mercurio tells a haunting tale that questions the power of ideology and the nature of fate.
Editorials
Publishers Weekly
British author Mercurio's American debut, a techno-thriller about a Russian pilot, offers plenty of action and suspense, but not enough characterization. We first meet Yefgenii Yeremin as an orphan in Stalingrad in 1946, the rest of his family having died in WWII. We never learn his age, only that he is big and strong and good at math. His math skills get him a scholarship to an aviation school, and from then on Yeremin dreams only of flying—first as one of the Russian MiG pilots who wore North Korean uniforms to attack American jets during the Korean War, then as an unsung hero of the Russian space program. Gripping action scenes include a gut-wrenching solo flight in which he's almost killed, but too many details of training pad out a short book, and nothing in it really tells us enough about Yeremin to make us care what happens to him. Mercurio (Bodies) trained as a doctor and served with the Royal Air Force. (Mar.)
Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.Library Journal
British author Mercurio follows up his highly regarded debut, Bodies, with the story of a Soviet pilot who aims to make his name as an astronaut. Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.Library Journal
Could the Soviets have been the first to put a man on the moon? This is the premise of British screenwriter and novelist Mercurio's (Bodies) gritty and often brutal novel of the Soviet version of the race to the moon. Yevgenii Yeremin was raised as an orphan under horrific conditions; perseveres to become a fighter pilot; and, later, sees the moon landing as his chance at immortality. His story is not a pleasant one, though it is haunting nonetheless. Yeremin's life in the former Soviet Union is alternately grim, triumphant, and, ultimately, tragic. Sprinkled with real characters—e.g., cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, astronaut Gus Grissom—the book has the feel of reality and conveys the USSR's desperate efforts to succeed in the space race. Mercurio is a former doctor who was with Britain's Royal Air Force, qualifications that bring obvious credibility to this, his American debut. Often compelling, although the grimness of the subject matter may limit the book's popularity; for larger collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ11/15/06.]
—Robert Conroy Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information