Chris Hadfield Books in Order

If you want tense Cold War space thrillers: The Apollo Murders → The Defector → Final Orbit
If you prefer real-life astronaut stories and advice: An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth
If you love striking space photography and Earth views: You Are Here: Around the World in 92 Minutes
If you are reading with young space fans (~4–8): The Darkest Dark

Chris Hadfield grew up on a corn farm in southern Ontario, far from any spaceport, but close to the night sky. Born in Sarnia in 1959, he was nine years old when he watched the Apollo 11 Moon landing on television and quietly decided he wanted to be an astronaut.

Canada did not even have an astronaut program yet, so his plan started on the ground. As a teenager he joined the Royal Canadian Air Cadets, earned a glider pilot licence at fifteen and a powered pilot licence at sixteen, and learned that discipline and checklists mattered as much as raw enthusiasm.

After high school he joined the Canadian Armed Forces and studied mechanical engineering at military college. Flight training led him to fast jets, and he eventually became a Cold War fighter pilot, intercepting Soviet bombers over the North. He went on to graduate as a test pilot in the United States, flying dozens of aircraft and learning how to stay calm when complex machines misbehaved.

In 1992 he was selected as one of only four new Canadian astronauts. He moved to Houston, worked on shuttle cockpit upgrades and safety issues, and became the familiar voice of mission control as chief CAPCOM for many shuttle flights. In 1995 he flew on STS-74 to help dock the Space Shuttle to the Russian space station Mir, then returned to orbit in 2001 on STS-100 to install Canadarm2 on the International Space Station and became the first Canadian to walk in space.

Hadfield's third flight, aboard Soyuz TMA-07M in 2012, took him back to the International Space Station for a long stay and, eventually, command of Expedition 35. During five months in orbit he oversaw hundreds of experiments, supported an unexpected emergency spacewalk, and spent his spare time sharing life in space with millions of people back on Earth.

Those months turned him into an unlikely public storyteller. His guitar performances, from folk songs to a now famous version of Space Oddity, his short how to videos about everyday tasks in zero gravity, and a steady stream of photographs of Earth all helped people feel that the space station was not remote at all.

When he retired from the Canadian Space Agency in 2013, he began to put those experiences into books. An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth mixes memoir with practical ideas about preparation, teamwork, risk and perspective. You Are Here: Around the World in 92 Minutes collects his favorite orbital photographs into a tour of the planet. The Darkest Dark revisits his childhood fear of the night and turns it into an encouraging story for young readers.

More recently he has turned to fiction with the Apollo Murders series, a trio of Cold War space thrillers that includes The Apollo Murders, The Defector and Final Orbit. Drawing on real missions, hardware and training, the novels let him explore a different question: what might have happened if history had taken a slightly more dangerous path.

Hadfield now divides his time between Ontario and an airplane seat, advising space companies, helping new space startups through a tech incubator, teaching as an adjunct professor, and speaking to audiences around the world. Whether he is writing for adults, kids or thriller fans, he keeps circling the same idea that first grabbed him as a boy in 1969, that seeing Earth from space can change how we treat each other down here.