Victorian Premier's Literary Award 2017: This Year's Winners!

I pinched the short list from the Wheeler Centre web site, after reading on the Age web site that the winner of the Fiction award had died and the prize was posthumous. The awards were only handed out this evening.

So much for my going on Twitter to find out these things in time. Sigh!

The only two judges I've heard of are the lovely Alice Pung and Marlee Jane Ward, though I've only heard of the latter because we were both on a panel at last year's Continuum. I did download her YA novel, but haven't got around to reading more than a page or two. I am such a greedy reader, I just can't read it all!

Of the books, I have The Bone Sparrow, which I really must read, because it's bound to be on this year's CBCA shortlist, and The Fighter, which is a wonderful book that deserves an award. But then, I haven't read the others on the list. To be honest I don't read much in the way of adult books.  Non fiction, yes, if it's about a subject that interests me. Genre fiction, yes. But not mainstream and certainly not a book about a woman who gets brain cancer. (The winner) Mind you, teenagers love to sob their hearts out over novels with dying protagonists. So maybe that one will have a new market in a few years, the theme is just not my cup of tea. Sad about the author, though! 

Anyway, here it is, in case you want to follow it up. Enjoy!

The Judges

Fiction: Stella Charls, Alice Pung, Jo Case (convener)

Non-fiction: Bruce Pascoe, Sami Shah, Jordy Silverstein, Michaela McGuire, Sharon Mullins (convener)

Drama: Jane Harrison, Emilie Collyer, John Bailey (convener)

Poetry: Samah Sabawi, Emilie Zoey Baker, Alicia Sometimes (convener)

Writing for Young Adults: Marlee Jane Ward, Davina Bell, Jess Tran (convener)

The shortlist

I've put the winners in bold.

Fiction

• Between a Wolf and a Dog by Georgia Blain (Scribe Publications)
• The Healing Party by Micheline Lee (Black Inc.)
• Wood Green by Sean Rabin (Giramondo)
• Waiting by Philip Salom (Puncher and Wattmann)
• The Rules of Backyard Cricket by Jock Serong (Text Publishing)
• The Love of a Bad Man by Laura Elizabeth Woollett (Scribe Publications)

Non-fiction

• Songs of a War Boy by Deng Adut with Ben Mckelvey (Hachette Australia)
• The Hate Race by Maxine Beneba Clarke (Hachette Australia)
• The Killing Season Uncut by Sarah Ferguson with Patricia Drum (Melbourne University Publishing)
• Offshore: Behind the wire on Manus and Nauru by Madeline Gleeson (NewSouth Publishing)
• Position Doubtful by Kim Mahood (Scribe Publications)
• The Fighter by Arnold Zable (Text Publishing)

Drama

• Girl Shut Your Mouth by Gita Bezard (Black Swan State Theatre Company)
• Trigger Warning by Zoë Coombs Marr (Melbourne International Comedy Festival)
• The Drover’s Wife by Leah Purcell (Currency Press)

Poetry

• Carrying the World by Maxine Beneba Clarke (Hachette Australia)
• Painting Red Orchids by Eileen Chong (Pitt Street Poetry)
• Bull Days by Tina Giannoukos (Australian Scholarly Publishing)

Writing for Young Adults

• When Michael Met Mina by Randa Abdel-Fattah (Pan Macmillan Australia). Also won the People's Choice Award. 
• The Bone Sparrow by Zana Fraillon (Hachette Australia)
• The Other Side of Summer by Emily Gale (Penguin Random House Australia)

Highly commended

Fiction
· An Isolated Incident by Emily McGuire (Pan Macmillan)
· Our Magic Hour by Jennifer Down (Text Publishing)
· After the Carnage by Tara June Winch (University of Queensland Press)

Writing for Young Adults
· Freedom Swimmer by Wai Chim (Allen and Unwin)
· Frankie by Shivaun Plozza (Penguin Books Australia)

Drum Roll, Please! Australia's Top Authors 2017

Again, I'm sticking to those who have written for kids, and there are several between 10 and 1.

#10: Marcus Zusak. Best known, these days, for The Book Thief, which has been translated into forty languages and been turned into a very good movie. But he has been on the CBCA shortlist for other books and that one works fine as a YA novel. I remember hearing him speak at a school library conference once, years ago, before he became an international bestselling author. He'd written his first novel and I swear, he looked about sixteen! He was young, though not quite that young, and I bought he book to support a new local author. He's come a long way since then. I doubt a local library conference could afford him these days. 

#9 Andy Griffiths. When I started my school library career, the big name in funny children's books was Paul Jennings. Paul was our Roald Dahl, but nicer. Nowadays, he has been more or less replaced by Andy Griffiths, who writes the Treehouse books, the Schooling Around series, the Just series and the series that began with The Day My Bum Went Psycho. (In the U.S., that's "Butt", as "bum" has a different meaning in American slang). He understands what makes kids laugh out loud and is rewarded every year when kids vote him their favourite in the Young Australian Best Book Awards. A delightful writer - and such a nice man! I have been lucky enough to meet him a couple of times. Once, when I mentioned my disadvantaged school, he gave me a signed set of the new edition of Schooling Around for the library, which was great, because the individual novels were always going missing.

#6. Anh Do. We have several of his  funny WeirDo novels for children. His autobiography,  The Happiest Refugee, is the class text for Year 9, and the kids actually like it. Given how many refugees we have at my school, I think they can relate. But in general, they enjoy it, even the EAL kids. 

#5. John Marsden. Best known for the YA series, Tomorrow When The War Began, but has written quite a lot more. There was a film made of the first one and one of the cast later went on to play the role of Phryne Fisher's maid Dot. It's a powerful series and at one time it was hardly ever on the shelves. Not as popular now, but a few years ago, when I took some students to the local launch of the National Year Of Reasing, he was the guest speaker and there were plenty of kids there. The author actually gave away copies of his books and signed them. Nice!

#3. This one is for my American librarian friend Pamela, who is a fan - Mem Fox! Mem is the author of the classic Possum Magic, about a little possum who has been turned invisible and who has to eat his way through Australian foods in various states to recover his visibility. 

#2. Tim Winton. Best known for his adult books, but also the author of the classic Lockie Leonard YA novels, set in Western Australia, with a surfing theme. The first was on our Year 8 list at one stage. A mother objected, because there is a scene where the hero has a wet dream. She withdrew her objection after one of our staff had a chat with her, explaining about the book. It is funny and sad and sweet and the sea is almost a character. 

#1. Matthew Reilly. I probably don't need to explain him. He is tremendously well known and popular for all those extremely violent books. I must admit, I'm no fan of his; I managed to get through about 250 pages of Temple. People were getting killed and things blown up on every page - and no one cared. When a character sacrificed himself for another character and she didn't even blink let alone mourn him, I threw my copy against the wall and never read anything else of his again. But teenage boys enjoy his work. The ones at my school who want to read his books tend to have their own copies, though I'd buy them on request. I am in a minority here, I confess. But this year, he is Australia's most popular author. Congratulations, Matthew! 

Australia's Favourite Authors 2017 - #50-11!

I've been following Booktopia's reader-voted "Australia's favourite authors." This week we have seen the finalists from #50 onwards. Each year, there are new authors and old favourites. People who were closer to the top last time may be a bit lower this year, depending on who voted - or maybe who wanted to give someone else a go this time. We all have our favourites and as we read we acquire new ones. 

Anyway, here are those who have come up so far. I have mostly stuck either to children's and YA authors or those I know have written for kids at some stage. They're all authors whose work I have read, including the two writers for adults I stuck in at the bottom. If you want to check out the rest, why not head over to the Booktopia web site? 

#46 - John Flanagan - the author of the wonderful Ranger's Apprentice series. Go read them NOW!

#44 - Garth Nix - author of the fabulous Old Kingdom series(Sabriel, etc.) and the children's series Keys To The Kingdom. 

#41 - Melina Marchetta - these days best known for Jellicoe Road, but her first, Looking For Alibrandi,  is my favourite. Also the author of the fantasy Lumatere series beginning with Finnikin Of The Rock.

#40 - Tara Moss - I admit I don't read the crime fiction for which she is best known, but her YA fantasy novels are a hoot! 

#37 - Kate Forsyth - the author of a lot of adult novels based on fairy tales, such as Bitter Greens, but also quite a few children's books, such as The Puzzle Ring. 

#34 - Shaun Tan - my favourite of his books is The Arrival, which is straight art, telling the story of a refugee's arrival in an unnamed country. Not a single bit of text, but utterly powerful! 

#30 - Isobelle Carmody - probably best known for her Obernewtyn books, but also the author of several stand-alone books. Personally, I am STILL waiting for the final volume of Legendsong, which stopped on a cliffhanger around sixteen years ago. Sigh! 

#26 - Ruth Park - mostly an author for adults, she also wrote two wonderful YA fantasy novels, My Sister Sif and the amazing Playing Beattie Bow, which was made into a delightful film. 

#22 - Morris Gleitzman - author of a LOT of amazing children's books. The most popular, for good reason, are the series that began with Once and most recently Soon. The hero is Felix, a boy who has a lot of adventures while on the run from the Nazis. He loses a lot of people he cares for. He is such a great kid! And in the third book, halfway through the series, the author flies into the present day and tells the story from the viewpoint of his Australian granddaughter. Lovely stuff! 

#20 - Emily Rodda - most famous for the Deltora series for children, but also writes mysteries for adults under her own name, Jennifer Rowe. At one time she was editor of the Australian Women's Weekly.

#17 - Jackie French - author of a huge number of historical novels for children, former Australian Children's Laureate, several CBCA shortlistings under her belt. Amazingly popular in my school, considering how hard it is to get our kids to read historical fiction! 

#16 - Graeme Base - fantastic artist and picture storybook author. One of his first books was Animalia, a wonderfully clever alphabet books with detailed paintings that invite the young reader to find all the pictures starting with the letter of that page. For example, "Diabolical Dragons Daintily Devouring Delicacies" has a background window through which you can see the Doctor and a Dalek. And a donkey. There's a background picture of a dagger hanging over someone. "Dagger" might be okay for kids, but as in the Asterix comics, there's a bit more for the adults reading with them - Damocles, right? It had a CBCA shortlisting, but didn't win. The book that did win is long forgotten. While Animalia has become a classic - I have the app on my iPad.  The kids at my school used to have it out every lunchtime, by the way. 

#15 - May Gibbs - author of Snugglepot and Cuddlepie, classic Aussie picture storybook. Her home has become a museum. 

#12 - Paul Jennings - the predecessor of Andy Griffiths. His books are hilarious and some of the short stories were used in the TV series Round The Twist. He hasn't written much in recent years, alas. I think he's done one or two picture books, which I must check out. 

And adult writers I like are historical novelist Geraldine Brooks at #19 and national treasure poet Banjo Patterson at #11. He wrote all those bush poems, such as"Clancy Of The Overflow" and "The Man From Snowy River" and guess what? "Waltzing Matilda" is his too! 

Tomorrow we will know who are the top ten - stand by!

Halfway Through John Glenn: A Memoir...

I can't help feeling I'm learning a lot about John Glenn the person rather than what he did. I'm reading this side by side with The Astronaut Wives Club and it makes for an interesting comparison.

He spends a lot of time describing the various planes he flew - in great detail, what they could do, what the problems were, what happened with his next plane. I had a hard time focusing on all that and admit to sliding over some of the plane descriptions. 

But there's no question that he was a passionate flyer, that a lot of the stuff he volunteered for was because it was the only way he could keep flying instead of being stuck behind a desk. After World War II, seeing friends be killed, admitting that napalm was horrible and that maybe the bombs over Japan were not nice, he goes to Korea. The patriotism? Definitely, but mainly because it will keep him flying. He doesn't have the particular skills needed for commercial flight and anyway, people who do are applying for all the jobs available. In Korea he hopes he can do the Snoopy-Red Baron type of combat flying he wants so desperately, and he does, three times(five would have made him champion). 

I've just reached the bit where he has finally been accepted for the Mercury program. He admits to all the awful stuff the astronaut candidates had to go through in their medical tests. I read about that in The Right Stuff and other books on the subject. It was not only difficult, it was downright embarrassing!

Interestingly, that line about "sleeping under a Communist moon", which I have read elsewhere was spoken by LBJ, he attributes to Khruschev, as a sneer. You do have to wonder about this man...

But I'm finding that there was good reason for the fact that the astronauts were able to participate in the design of their spacecraft. They were all test pilots at this stage and it was something test pilots did. Even then, you really needed to have science and maths skills to be able to do the job. Glenn admits he had a hard time with the maths, though he eventually managed it, though he never quite got the hang of calculus.

Okay, on with the book and further comments when I've finished it. 

Australia's Favourite Author 2017: Final List

Once more, Booktopia is inviting readers to vote for their favourite local authors. You don't even have to stick to one person, as they recognise you have more than one favourite. I'm pleased to say there are several children's and YA authors on this short list. I've given them my preferences, though I've also voted for one or two writers for adults, who overlap. Do vote! Whoever ends up winning will not only be happy, they will have something to add to their resume and that's important when publishers make decisions(admittedly there are some "classic" writers on the list, such as May Gibbs and Banjo Patterson, who won't care if you vote for them. I stuck to live ones). You don't, I think, have to be living in Australia to vote, at least it doesn't say so, but there is a prize of $1000 worth of books if you give them your details - I certainly did! Why not wander over and see if your favourite Aussie author is there? (There is even a Kiwi, Juliet Marillier, but she lives here)

And here is the link.You have until January 20 to vote.
http://blog.booktopia.com.au/2017/01/16/vote-finals-favourite-australian-author-2017/

Now Reading...John Glenn: A Memoir and Simon Schama's French Revolution book!

Sometimes you just have to have it in print. I had to order the John Glenn book because it wasn't on iBooks and it wasn't at Dymock's in Melbourne despite being on the web site. The staff member explained that the web site had a different warehouse; I'd be better off ordering on line and having it in ten days than waiting for the shop to get it from overseas. So I ordered on line and had the fascination of tracking it on the Australia Post web site. At one point it was actually in West Sunshine, where I work. If I hadn't been on holiday I could have had it that day! 

As it was, it arrived yesterday. My neighbour made sure it was on my doormat for me when I opened the door yesterday. I was utterly excited and delighted and, of course, started reading it right away. Only a chapter in, but interesting so far. He was of a working class family on his Dad's side(Mum was a primary teacher). His father started off working on the railroads, then became a plumber. 

And he started his passion for flying one day when his Dad was driving along and there was this man in a field offering rides in a biplane(this was only a couple of years after Lindbergh's flight). His Dad said he could come up with him or wait, but he was going to have that ride. The rest is history. 

I bought the Simon Schama book at Dymock's on Thursday. I'd gone there to meet my friend Bart, who had a birthday on Tuesday. We were going to have afternoon tea afterwards. He had hoped to do that at the elegant Hopetoun Tearooms, but the queue outside put us off. Amazing. The place is around 100 years old - you'd think by now it would be taken for granted! I'd never seen that before, either. So we crossed the road instead and had our tea and chocolates at Ganache. But the thing is, when I enter a bookshop I almost invariably leave with a book. Citizens actually is available in ebook, but... I just love anything by Simon Schama and, well, I couldn't leave without it. 

Anyone else like that about bookshops?

Two Troll Tales From Norway Retold by Margrete Lamond, Ill. by Ingrid Kallick. Armidale NSW: Christmas Press, 2016

Here's another delightful, beautifully-illustrated folktale volume from the amazing Christmas Press.

This time the theme is that Norwegian creature of mischief, the troll. Forget about the Tolkien variety which is a huge, not-too-bright peasant and turns into stone at sunrise. Forget even the Terry Pratchett variety, which has a silicon brain, can live in the city, work in the police force and needs the cold to be smart. 

The trolls in these stories can change shape if they wish and are closer to the Faerie folk than to the big, thick-as-two-planks version in fantasy fiction. They don't even live under bridges. 

The first story, "The Little Old Lady From Around The Bend", is about something that happened in  the old lady's youth. The girl in the story suffers the same fate as those folk in other stories who are silly enough to help out the ungrateful Faerie and then admit to having seen them afterwards. As if that's not bad enough, she doesn't even get to enjoy her official reward for having helped the trolls. 

In the second story, "The Golden Ball Of Yarn", yet again we are made aware of the problems of helping or even being involved with the Faerie. A young woodcutter hands back a ball of golden yarn to  a huldra girl and finds himself controlled by her for some time, till he finally manages to escape to the other side of the world. 

The huldra are Scandinavian critters that can help or punish mortals. The women are beautiful, except they have tails, the men are ugly. 

There is humour in both tales, which are lively and cheerful, though the second story could have been tragic. The author links them to her own family - the girl in the first story was a crazy old lady remembered by her great grandmother from her childhood, while the woodcutter is someone met on the ship  to the other side of the world(presumably Australia) by her grandfather. 

Both give the traditional warning to children: "Don't trust the Faerie folk!"

The artwork is stunningly beautiful and appropriate to the stories told. I especialły liked the first story's frontispiece which shows a young girl going down the hill from her cottage, which sits on top of a pile of rocks shaped like a sleeping old woman.

You can buy this book from the publisher's web site, from Booktopia and the Book Depository, or, if you live in Australia, you can just ask for it at your local bookshop! 

Fantastically Great Women Who Changed The World by Kate Pankhurst. Sydney: Bloomsbury, 2016.

From Coco Chanel to Rosa Parks, Fantastically Great Women Who Changed the World is bursting full of astounding facts and incredible artwork on some of the most brilliant women who helped shape the world we live in.

Kate Pankhurst, descendent of Emmeline Pankhurst, has created this wildy wonderful and accessible book about women who really changed the world.

Discover fascinating facts about some of the most amazing women who changed the world we live in. Fly through the sky with the incredible explorer Amelia Earhart, and read all about the Wonderful Adventures of Mary Seacole with this fantastic full colour book.  (Publisher's blurb from Allen and Unwin website.)

I did wonder when I read this book if the author-illustrator was any relation to the suffragette Pankhursts. Nice to know that their descendant is now able to do stuff like writing about women's achievements. Her other children's books are fiction.

The author has chosen a good variety of women who did different things. Of course, her ancestor is in there, but she is only one entry in a variety. There is also swimmer Gertrude Ederle, who swam the English Channel at a time when women just didn't do that. There's Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, with an easy-to-follow explanation of what was behind those colourful paintings. There's Mary Anning, a young girl who grew up in the Regency era, finding and collecting fossils. The family did it for a living, in their home at Lyme Regis, to sell to tourists, but when she made some major finds, they called in the scientists. It was fourteen year old Mary who discovered the ichthyosaur. As a young woman she discovered the plesiosaur. I had heard of her, but only briefly on a radio show on the ABC. I must look up more. 

Mary Seacole gets a page too. This nurse set up her own hospital in the Crimea during the Crimean War, because as a black woman she had been turned down as an official nurse(Florence Nightingale - remember? Although as I recall, she did say Florence Nightingale was quite helpful to her once she got there). Probably just as well, because she treated the wounded men of both sides of the conflict.

It's a charming book which can set children off in all directions, to find out more, and might make little girls feel better about themselves. The artwork is delightfully whimsical and suits the text perfectly.

Should suit girls from about seven upwards, or can be read to younger ones. There is a useful glossary at the back, to explain hard words. Not enough books have that these days!

Buy it at any good bookshop or online retailer!

Odd And The Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman. Ill. by Chris Riddelll. Sydney: Bloomsbury, 2016

Odd, a young Viking boy, is left fatherless following a raid and in his icy, ancient world there is no mercy for an unlucky soul with a crushed foot and no one to protect him. Fleeing to the woods, Odd stumbles upon and releases a trapped bear … and then Odd's destiny begins to change. The eagle, bear and fox Odd encounters are Norse gods, trapped in animal form by the evil frost giants who have conquered Asgard, the city of the gods. Now our hero must reclaim Thor's hammer, outwit the frost giants and release the gods …  (Publisher's blurb)

When you see a new children's book that combines the talents of the amazing Neil Gaiman and Children's Laureate, artist Chris Riddell, you know you're in for something special. I have been lucky enough to read and review previous collaborations by these two, Fortunately, The Milk...  and The Sleeper And The Spindle and there is no question in my mind that as creators they belong together. Each of them is excellent alone, but together? Something very special, strengthening the work of both.

Neil Gaiman has shown that he can write both for adults and children. And this is one you can confidently hand to the eight or nine year old in your life, or read to them.  It has just a little bit of information about Norse society at the start, without making the young readers feel they're in the classroom - perhaps just enough for them to go and look up more. Odd's late father is only a part-time warrior, as are all the other Vikings; his day job is a woodcutter. In fact, Odd becomes crippled due to trying to use an axe that's too heavy for him. And his father didn't die in battle, he died on the way back, of cold and wet, after rescuing a packhorse fallen overboard. That adds a touch of reality to the fantasy world, in which you might wake up and hear animals talking without wondering, What the heck! and then find a way to Asgard, without thinking, Hey, I'm talking to Thor and Loki! There's humour, too, with the quarrelling gods, a bit of genuine Norse myth and Odd using his brains to solve the problem, not suddenly picking up an axe and wielding it. (Well, the ice giant is just a bit too big for that, even if he wasn't crippled).

Chris Riddell's artwork is breathtakingly beautiful, as always. He could make a living just from illustrating fairytale re-tellings, and be counted among the great fairytale illustrators.

Another book you will need to buy two copies of, if you are to part with one. My young nephew is getting this one when this review is up.

Buy it from the publisher's web site here. Or from Booktopia, here.  In fact, you can buy it pretty much anywhere, including your local good bookshop, which will order it in for you if they don't have it. Why not try there first and keep bricks and mortar stores in business?

Dear "Head Of Library" Reposted From My Livejournal

Dear "Head Of Library",

I read your article in a school library journal. It was about improving schools' perceptions of teacher-librarians.

Which is absolutely fine, I'm all in favour of getting some respect from the administration. It's when you spent your entire article giving advice to "library teams" to remind everyone that they are teachers as well as librarians that I started to wonder what kind of schools you've been working in lately. I looked you up and found you'd been "head of library" at a couple of private schools and were now working part time at another private school and enjoying the break from being in charge. You did say you'd worked at some state schools, though not which ones, and I suspect they were nice middle-class ones in areas where the parents can afford private education but have chosen to send their kids to a state school. They're the kind of schools where you can put a laptop computer on the book list and know parents will buy it.

Well, I'm head of library too, as I'm the only teacher-librarian on my campus. My team consists of me and a two-day-a-week library technician and I'm lucky to have her. If she retired or left, I would be alone. It saves money. They don't cover her any more when she has to take time off. They used to.

And I don't have to remind anyone that I'm a teacher, because, despite being the sole TL, I also have to teach classes. For that matter, so does a friend of mine who is now working at a private girls' school, who is only a little better off than me in staffing, though I bet her budget is better.

What I really want is to have my job as a librarian recognised, stuff the teaching side of it! I'd like to have a support team like yours, Head Of Library, to be able to get together and do great things that cost money, then pat ourselves on the back for being terrific librarians and also teachers(don't forget!)

But you do what you can. I haven't had time to do things like Readers' Cup, though I probably should invite kids to do the Premier's Reading Challenge. It's better if you have support from the English staff, but it can be done informally. You do need to have the books in the library to be borrowed, though, and I'm not sure I have everything on the list. 

I have been able to do book launches and get in the newspapers for those events. I'm running a student book club, which helps choose books for the library and goes on excursions when I can arrange something cheap for them. I write a book blog and occasionally invite students to interview authors, said interviews going on to my blog.

I've been lucky, as a writer, to have some fellow writers offer us a freebie(they get fed and gifted and newspapers are called, the best I can do, since I can't pay them). We're members of YABBA, which offers the occasional freebie too.

I've done virtual readouts with the kids for Banned Books Week. Hey, it's free and they love it!

My colleagues and the kids know what I do. I wish the admin did.

But please, Head Of Library, stop giving advice to people who have had greater challenges than you.

Thank you.
Sue

Now Reading...The Astronaut Wives Club by Lily Koppel

And thoroughly enjoying so far! 

When you do the whole "sensawunda" thing about the early space program, you think about the magnificent men in their flying machines zooming off into space. You don't think immediately about the women who had already spent years as the wives of test pilots, more or less bringing up the kids alone, wondering every day if their men would ever come home. The women who often worked at low-paying jobs to help their husbands finish their degrees while giving up their own education. 

And suddenly they were in the spotlight, with journalists and photographers camping out in their gardens or out in the street, and there was a deal with Life Magazine, so you had to be available for family shots and interviews. It wasn't all bad, of course. The pay was a lot better. They could afford stuff they hadn't been able to afford before, maybe even go out for a night on the town and to pay a babysitter! 

What I hadn't realised was that they were important to NASA too. The astronauts were not just chosen for themselves. This was going to be huge publicity. They had to be married - happily married. The wives had to be respectable - and patriotic. A man's chance of getting the astronaut gig actually depended on his wife. In one case, that of Gordo Cooper of the Mercury Seven, his wife had left him, taking the kids, and he had to go after her and beg her to return. Trudy Cooper was a strong woman, herself a qualified pilot who flew a lot. She was persuaded to return.The whole space thing was irresistible. 

I haven't read far, but I think this is going to be a fascinating book!