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Rating: 
Summary: Comprehensive But Muddy Reading
Review: * Rex Hall and David Shayler's SOYUZ -- A UNIVERSAL SPACECRAFT
provides a history of the Soviet-Russian Soyuz manned space capsule.
It outlines the origin and evolution of the spacecraft, discussing
variants planned for manned lunar missions and those used in Earth
orbit missions, including both stand-alone flights and space-station
ferry flights. It also discusses the Progress unmanned freighter
derivative. Spacecraft technology is described in detail, as are all
the flights.This is an impressively comprehensive book and a very valuable
reference for a serious spaceflight enthusiast. Unfortunately, it is
flawed by the fact that the writing is uninspired and unimpressive.
The authors start at A and go to Z, filling up the space between with
details. To be sure, trying to document a sequence of dozens of
spaceflights in adequate detail and not glaze a reader's eyes over is
difficult, but SOYUZ is simply cluttered. It's about 470 pages long;
it would have been more readable if it had been about 300 pages and
lost nothing. I had to roll my eyes at the authors' focus on details
when they starting giving background information on the pilot of a
helicopter that picked up some cosmonauts. The authors also should have provided a hierarchical structure that
would have made the material easier to follow. If I had tried to
write a book like this, I would have written a four-page survey of it
and used it as an introduction -- then written a 40-page short version
and used it as the first chapter, or broken it up and used it to
provide introductory overviews for each chapter. It would have also
been nice to have had "evolutionary charts" of Soyuz variants, and
other tools to make things clear. There are summaries in this book
but they are very terse, and the tables are basically data dumps that
are as cluttered as the text. I will give plenty of credit where credit is due for the extensive
legwork the authors put in on this book. This book does provide a
real value, I will make good use of it, and I can recommend it. I
just have to add that it is frustrating to wade through a book where
the authors didn't seem to understand the concept of
"user-friendliness".
Rating: 
Summary: Long-awaited reference book on Soviet Russian Spaceflight
Review: The Soviet/Russian space program has already operated 4 space stations ( Salyut-series, Mir, ISS ). This book by BIS president Rex D. Hall focuzes on the story of the Soyuz spacecraft which has been used to bring both visitors and resident crews to the Space Stations. An integral element of Salyut , Mir and Internatioanl Space Station ISS operations, the small ferry has been the mainstay of cosmonaut transportation since 1967. In addition, since 1978 the unmanned freighter version called Progress has provided a means in which to regularly re-supply a space station and so prolong its orbital lifetime.
Using authentic Soviet and Russian sources this book is the first known work in the west dedicated to revealing the full story of the Soyuz series. The book describes Mission Hardware and Support Docking Missions from 1966 - 70 , the 1971-81 Soyuz Manned Ferry, the 1978 onwards Progress Cargo-Resupply Ferry , the 1979 - 86 Soyuz T manned ferry, the updated Soyuz TM, 1986 - 2002 to Mir and the very latest Soyuz TMA which has become the vehicle to bring crews to ISS since the accident of shuttle Columbia.
An excellent reference work (it includes a complete listing of vehicle production numbers ), the only minus I see is that this book is not available in Hardcover ...
Philip CORNEILLE
Rating:
Summary: Long-awaited reference book on Soviet Russian Spaceflight
Review: The Soviet/Russian space program has already operated 4 space stations ( Salyut-series, Mir, ISS ). This book by BIS president Rex D. Hall focuzes on the story of the Soyuz spacecraft which has been used to bring both visitors and resident crews to the Space Stations. An integral element of Salyut , Mir and Internatioanl Space Station ISS operations, the small ferry has been the mainstay of cosmonaut transportation since 1967. In addition, since 1978 the unmanned freighter version called Progress has provided a means in which to regularly re-supply a space station and so prolong its orbital lifetime.
Using authentic Soviet and Russian sources this book is the first known work in the west dedicated to revealing the full story of the Soyuz series. The book describes Mission Hardware and Support Docking Missions from 1966 - 70 , the 1971-81 Soyuz Manned Ferry, the 1978 onwards Progress Cargo-Resupply Ferry , the 1979 - 86 Soyuz T manned ferry, the updated Soyuz TM, 1986 - 2002 to Mir and the very latest Soyuz TMA which has become the vehicle to bring crews to ISS since the accident of shuttle Columbia.
An excellent reference work (it includes a complete listing of vehicle production numbers ), the only minus I see is that this book is not available in Hardcover ...
Philip CORNEILLE
Rating:
Summary: Very Informative, But What a Rough Read!
Review: This book adds a lot of insight into how the Soviet and now Russian Space programs developed and refined Soyuz. It will leave you with a solid knowledge of what a workhorse it is - not as sexy as the Shuttle - more like a crew cab pickup truck that just gets better and better with every version release. The majority of the book has great relevant technical detail with some good yarn spinning to add flavor. The functional relationship between Soyuz and Salyut, MIR and ISS is nicely detailed in this book. With that said, it's a shame the authors released it with out more editing. There is one section that clearly was published in draft form with the notations left in for further clarification or to add more information at a later date. It is actually kind of amusing that the authors where using a shorthand at one point that was meant to be searched and replaced - and they didn't - thus they share there cute nickname for the Russians. The authors should be applauded for the hard work they put into researching and assembling this book. The publisher should be spanked for not finding them a couple of hungry graduate engineering assistants to help turn this into something more readable
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