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A review by karieh13
Sex on the Moon: The Amazing Story Behind the Most Audacious Heist in History by Ben Mezrich
3.0
Reading about larger than life characters and larger than life undertakings is fascinating to me. However, while certainly interesting, I didn’t find the story of Thad Roberts fascinating. I suppose it might be because although novel, the story of this part of his life and the story of this crime didn’t ask or answer any big questions for me. I ended up being disappointed not so much in the book, but in the person described in the book.
In many stories about true crime, there is a desire to understand “Why?” Why people do such horrific things, what happened in their lives to drive them to commit such crimes? We want to understand “Why?” so that we can identify what it is about these people that makes them not like us, and want to identify ourselves as very much not like them.
In “Sex on the Moon”, however, the crime is neither horrific nor particularly clever. It is unique in that moon rocks had never been stolen before…. (I did learn that it was illegal to own moon rocks, which certainly make sense, but was a new fact for me.) One of the major reasons for this, a reason that keeps Thad from committing the crime for a while, is that those people who have access to the rocks, wouldn’t consider doing something that would remove their chance to be a part of one of the greatest undertakings of humankind.
Instead, the crime is one committed for most of the usual reasons. Love, money and much too large an ego. This young man sees himself as more important than the program – a star more important than the universe itself. Thad compares himself several times to James Bond and the reader is made very aware that he thinks of himself as practically a hero.
“Steeling himself – without the help of a really good theme song – Thad skirted past the low hedge and across the crowded parking lot.”
It’s a shame that a great mind, so in love with learning, goes so wrong. That instead of focusing on the ways that he could move exploration and knowledge forward, that he is deterred by more profitable motives.
“Thad has his own word for it: serenity. The moment when the act of science organically shifted into the art of science; when even the most mundane, choreographed procedures achieved such a rhythm that they became invisible chords of a single violin lost in the complexity of a perfect symphony. Minutes shifting into a state of timelessness, where the world seemed frozen but Thad was somehow moving forward: content, fulfilled, free.”
For those of us who will only experience the science of space travel through films and television and books – it is very disappointing to read this story of someone who had a chance to get closer to the dream – and who threw it away.
At the end of the book, there is a hint that the ego that drove Thad to plan and commit this crime may have been humbled a bit. “Thad had always been a quick study. At NASA, being quick to pick up how things worked had been important because it had caught the attention of the people Thad had needed to impress, and it had given him that extra edge so that he could construct the person he wanted to be, right from day one. In county jail, being quick to pick up how things worked as important because it kept Thad alive.”
One can only hope that after having been confined to a jail cell, the art of the science can fulfill Roberts mind so that he can indeed, be free.
In many stories about true crime, there is a desire to understand “Why?” Why people do such horrific things, what happened in their lives to drive them to commit such crimes? We want to understand “Why?” so that we can identify what it is about these people that makes them not like us, and want to identify ourselves as very much not like them.
In “Sex on the Moon”, however, the crime is neither horrific nor particularly clever. It is unique in that moon rocks had never been stolen before…. (I did learn that it was illegal to own moon rocks, which certainly make sense, but was a new fact for me.) One of the major reasons for this, a reason that keeps Thad from committing the crime for a while, is that those people who have access to the rocks, wouldn’t consider doing something that would remove their chance to be a part of one of the greatest undertakings of humankind.
Instead, the crime is one committed for most of the usual reasons. Love, money and much too large an ego. This young man sees himself as more important than the program – a star more important than the universe itself. Thad compares himself several times to James Bond and the reader is made very aware that he thinks of himself as practically a hero.
“Steeling himself – without the help of a really good theme song – Thad skirted past the low hedge and across the crowded parking lot.”
It’s a shame that a great mind, so in love with learning, goes so wrong. That instead of focusing on the ways that he could move exploration and knowledge forward, that he is deterred by more profitable motives.
“Thad has his own word for it: serenity. The moment when the act of science organically shifted into the art of science; when even the most mundane, choreographed procedures achieved such a rhythm that they became invisible chords of a single violin lost in the complexity of a perfect symphony. Minutes shifting into a state of timelessness, where the world seemed frozen but Thad was somehow moving forward: content, fulfilled, free.”
For those of us who will only experience the science of space travel through films and television and books – it is very disappointing to read this story of someone who had a chance to get closer to the dream – and who threw it away.
At the end of the book, there is a hint that the ego that drove Thad to plan and commit this crime may have been humbled a bit. “Thad had always been a quick study. At NASA, being quick to pick up how things worked had been important because it had caught the attention of the people Thad had needed to impress, and it had given him that extra edge so that he could construct the person he wanted to be, right from day one. In county jail, being quick to pick up how things worked as important because it kept Thad alive.”
One can only hope that after having been confined to a jail cell, the art of the science can fulfill Roberts mind so that he can indeed, be free.