On January 12, 1997, Dr. Jerry M. Linenger took off aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis, en route to an historic rendezvous with the Russian Space Station Mir. One of the few American astronauts to formally partner with Russian cosmonauts, he had been selected to spend five months aboard Mir, participating in a joint initiative to lay the groundwork for a new International Space Station. As the Atlantis rose into the flawless Florida sky, so did Linenger's elation. Here, at last, was the culmination of years of careful planning, self-sacrifice, and rigorous training, including a two-year stint at the cosmonaut training complex in desolate Star City, Russia.

But when he finally boarded Mir and took his first tour around the dark, ramshackle, incredibly cluttered space station, reminiscent of "six school buses all hooked together," Linenger knew he was in for a rough ride. Little did he know just how rough it would be, or how many brushes with death he and his Russian colleagues would face over the next 132 days.

A hair-raising tale of survival in the forbidding depths of space, Off the Planet tells, for the first time, the complete story of that ill-starred mission. Not since Apollo 13 had a mission been beset by so many near-fatal catastrophes. But while the former lasted only a few breathless days, the Mir mission went on for five months - 132 days of unremitting danger and deprivation that stretched the crew's ingenuity, endurance, and courage to the limit.

In a dramatic, first-person narrative, Linenger chronicles the crew's heroic day-to-day struggle to keep themselves and their mission alive in the face of failing equipment on board and bureaucratic arrogance and political maneuvering on the ground. Lacking adequate provisions and choking on antifreeze fumes leaking from rusting pipes, the crew battled system failure after system failure. More than once they experienced complete power failures that left them in total darkness, tumbling out of control through space. Linenger recounts the tense moments the crew spent watching helplessly as an unmanned cargo ship hurtled toward them at eighteen thousand miles per hour. And, most unforgettable of all, is his telling of the crew's nightmare encounter with one of the most terrifying of space hazards - fire. Unable to see or brethe, and blocked from the Soyuz lifeboat by three-foot spumes of metal-melting flame, the crew was in grave danger as fire raged in their ship.

The first complete and uncensored account of one of the most dangerous missions in the history of space exploration, Off the Planet is an unforgettable tale of men at their limits facing extreme danger - at the triumph of human spirit in the face of it all.

The Emotions Dr. Linenger Experienced

While Dr. Linenger vividly recounts those dramatic events, he also candidly focues on the feelings those events provoked - feelings of isolation, frustration, and fear counterpointed by self-reliance, determination, and courage.

Evocative, revealing, and sometimes humorous, Off the Planet tells what really happened on board Mir, not what was reported to the world by the image-conscious Russians. Readers will be riveted while lifting off with Dr. Linenger and living off the planet.

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