RVJ Callanan

Like it or not, Allan McDonald's insider account of the Challenger Disaster is a book for the ages. The early chapters are necessarily tedious which may put off the more superficial or time-pressed reader. Here, I am especially thinking of tech managers who have become so beholden to corporate speak that they are losing touch with their technical grassroots. If you find yourself sliding into this miasma, you will have most to gain from the lessons of this book — as will your employer because any organisation ignores engineering realities at its peril. So take a hit for the team and plough through the minutiae of sold rocket booster design and see what happens when the movers and shakers play God with tried-and-tested engineering principles. But do keep a reference on hand or you may get lost in a whirlwind of acronyms and empirical data. Knowledge that is hard won is best retained and your perseverance in the early chapters will deliver its own rewards. With many unexpected twists

They say you should never meet your heroes. Having grown up in 1970's Ireland, when portraits of Pope Paul VI and JFK took pride of place in almost every Irish home, I finally took the plunge by way of Seymour Hersh's well-researched tome to shatter any lingering illusions. When this book was first published in 1997, it was manna from heaven for those who rejoiced at our loss of innocence. But, long before the forces of cynicism and resentment took hold of our national psyche, we knew that the powers-that-be lived by different rules. Just like our favourite Hollywood stars, it was what they represented that really mattered — not their breathtaking hypocrisy. And let's be clear that the "untold stories of the rich and famous" were well-dissected by the dogs on the street long before they became a staple of the mainstream media. Great leaders have always courted controversy, especially in challenging times, because to do otherwise is a dereliction of duty. Great