Brian d’Eon Book Launch

Not all historical novelists give their characters what they long for. But author Brian d’Eon is willing to tweak history just enough to give his protagonist, German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, his dream of journeying to the moon with the Apollo space program. Brian d’Eon is launching his recently published, mostly historical novel Lunatics at the Nelson Public Library on Saturday, October 12^th, 7pm.

Wernher von Braun, a talented and complicated man, was a very real person in the history of the space race, even deemed by the history books as the “Father of Space Travel.” But where the Apollo XX mission was actually cancelled, d’Eno writes a different ending, sending von Braun to the moon and fulfilling the dreams he had as a young scientist in Nazi Germany.  The author takes readers on an intimate and visceral journey, recreating the sensations known only to moon walks. But more than just a technological adventure, d’Eon wanted to “explore the poetic impact the moon landings have had on the human psyche, to look beyond the politics and technology and try to understand why this last moon landing should be remembered as mankind’s last great collective act of optimism. Looking back all those years, I still find it remarkable, even miraculous, that the Apollo Program succeeded, that human footsteps actually made it to the Moon.”