Eight Days Gone
1 Paperback/1 CD (see all formats)

"Toddler-sized (and older) astronauts-in-training will enjoy this poetic journey to the moon and back. Reducing the historic Apollo 11 flight to rhyming couplets is a challenge that occasionally leads to nonsensical sequences (“Haul equipment / Careful test. / Exploration. / Lunar quest”), but narrator Guidall forges along with impressive gravitas, an approach that is underscored by background music ranging from sonorous to patriotic. The judicious addition of sound effects (the whoosh of the rocket, the crackle of radio transmissions, the capsule’s ocean splashdown, and the crowd at the triumphant parade) adds to the you-are-there experience. Guidall reads the brief author’s note at the end of the text at a slightly accelerated pace, appropriate to the intended audience of somewhat older readers. A satisfactory addition to library collections where youngsters still long to let go of gravity, fly free, and come home again safely."

"Master narrator George Guidall brings animation and historical solemnity to McReynolds's poem, which details the moon landing of 1969. He speaks each line distinctly with an understated and animated voice, leaving plenty of time between lines so that young listeners can pore over O'Rourke's illustrations and ponder each action of the Apollo 11 expedition. Sound effects are finely selected to underscore the meaning of specific events. A concluding author's note provides additional facts about the Apollo mission, the crew, the module's recovery, and of the importance of the mission to Kennedy's space plan of the 1960s."