| Welcome! I'm Mark Wolverton, author of The Science of Superman and The Depths of Space: The Story of the Pioneer Planetary Probes. Here you'll find out more about me and my various projects, including my latest book, A Life in Twilight: The Final Years of J. Robert Oppenheimer, now available at bookstores everywhere from St. Martin's Press!
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"A sympathetic account of a brilliant but enigmatic giant of 20th-century science." ~ Kirkus
“A Life in Twilight is a sensitive, engaging, and wonderfully readable rendering of the sad final decade of an American patriot brutalized by the destructive politics of the McCarthy era. As such, it is a welcome and vitally important contribution to our understanding of this complex man as well as of some of the consequences to our society when we allow government officials to use fear as a political weapon.”
~ Martin J. Sherwin, coauthor of American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer, 2006 winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Biography
"Wolverton brings sensitivity, insight, and convincing research to this attempt at encompassing the last 13 years of J. Robert Oppenheimer's life." ~ Library Journal
“The story of Robert Oppenheimer’s last years as told by Mark Wolverton makes an intense, compelling book. We need reminding of the price this country paid for the hounding of a great man: not just for the paranoia and vindictiveness of scoundrels like J. Edgar Hoover and Lewis Strauss, Oppenheimer’s chief persecutors, but for the way others---from President Eisenhower down---allowed the disaster to happen.”
~ Anthony Lewis, author of Gideon’s Trumpet, Portrait of a Decade, and Make No Law
"Opens a revealing window onto the intellectual climate of the cold war." ~ Publishers Weekly
For a sneak preview, watch my book trailer below...
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| Click on the cover to order from BN.com. |
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As of January 17, 2010...
- Check out my short story "One Potato, Two Potato" in the Winter 2009/10 online edition of Philadelphia Stories.
- The Nobel Prize in Physics is usually awarded for something fairly esoteric, but in 2009, it went to two scientists who invented something you're probably carrying around in your pocket: the CCD, the charge-coupled device, that makes digital imaging possible. I tell their story in "The Miracle of Digital Imaging" in the Winter 2010 issue of American Heritage of Invention & Technology.
- One of the airplanes in the Royal Air Force Museum in London isn't exactly in the same pristine restored condition as the others. The Handley-Page Halifax bomber flew only one mission, yet it lives on as a unique tribute to all the airmen of World War II. Find out how in "A Bomber's First and Last Mission" in the March 2010 issue of Aviation History.
- Read my interview at the book website Up Close and Personal.
- My article on aviation pioneer William Ocker, the "father of blind flying," has just been reprinted in Winter '09/'10 issue of The Yellow Sheet, the official magazine of the Marine Corps Aviation Association.
- In 2009, we celebrated the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11, one of humankind's most remarkable achievements. In the "Focal Point" column of the December 2009 issue of Sky & Telescope, I provide a gentle reminder of a few other important 2009 space exploration anniversaries that shouldn't be overlooked.
- And if you're in the mood for a little hard science, take a look at my latest web article for the Advanced Photon Source of Argonne National Laboratory.
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