The Astronaut and the Star

NASA astronaut Reggie Hayes is desperate to save her career after multiple public media missteps when she agrees to train Jon Leo, a gorgeous Hollywood movie star, who hopes to reinvent himself with a challenging acting role in an upcoming space-themed movie. Reggie is hard and uncompromising with her training of Jon, but his outrageous good looks and optimistic outlook soften Reggie’s feelings for him. Though each character excels in their professional careers, neither are emotionally engaging and in one exchange, even Reggie admits she has the “emotional maturity of a gnat.” Though listeners are informed of Reggie’s past sexual encounters with men and women, she and Jon go through some excruciating moments that are meant to be heated, sexy, and meaningful but, since both lack emotional security and experience, are annoyingly immature. The sex scenes lack sincerity because the characters are defined by superficiality and clichés, but Lucy Rivers and Oliver Clarke do a great job voicing these characters and make the book better with their clear narration.