*Atmosphere* by Taylor Jenkins Reid is a drop-everything-and-read novel that blends ambition, resilience, and romance against the backdrop of the 1980s American space program. The story follows astronomy professor Joan Goodwin as she dares to pursue her dream of becoming an astronaut, confronting NASA’s steep and often sexist hierarchy. Readers journey with Joan through the intense demands of space shuttle training and the unexpected path of self-discovery it sparks. Her tender romance with a fellow trainee adds emotional depth, unfolding with grace and authenticity. Fans of Reid’s work will fall in love all over again with this inspiring and beautifully crafted story.

Joan Goodwin has always been a science nerd, madly in love with the stars since she was a little girl. As an adult Joan is teaching at a university when her sister Barbara alerts her of an opportunity at NASA that will include women for the very first time in history. Although Joan is not accepted into that particular program, her dream of space becomes a reality when she is finally brought into a group of astronaut candidates in the summer of 1980. This small group of women scientists are surrounded by male egos and military pilots - well aware of their aspirations and limitations, the women must always do their very best. Joan is not only smart and kind, she is a team player that quickly rises in the ranks. Alongside the space, rocket and astronomy lessons scattered throughout the story we watch Joan explore a sexual awakening she never dreamed possible. As Joan creates close relationships with her crew, whose lives literally depend upon each other, she also deals with a difficult sister who unexpectedly gives her more and more responsibility raising her beloved niece Frances. I was pulled into this story quickly but midway it meandered off course and left me orbiting in space. Unfortunately, I think I am searching for Daisy Jones every time I pick up the latest book by Reid, and I am sorely disappointed.

Happy book birthday to this beauty! Atmosphere was the first book I read in 2025, and it's still one of my favorite books of the year. I'm absolutely thrilled it's finally out in the world for everyone to enjoy. It's always bittersweet to be, again, a @tjenkinsreid completist, but Joan Goodwin is a character who earns her spot on the TJR Hall of Fame with Daisy, Evelyn, Carrie and Nina. This post won't convince anyone to read this book (don't y'all already love or hate TJR?) But in case you don't know: 1980s astronaut, feminism (and sexism), science, love, friendship, and chosen family. It's lovely. I cried. I sobbed. I can't wait to get my print copy and re-read. And, of course, to see the spine of Nina's story next to her fellow TJR icons.

This book absolutely had me hooked from beginning to end! I will not spoil the ending but I was sitting here sobbing over it! Taylor Jenkins Reid is an absolutely masterful author and this is in contention for the best book of 2025!

Lordy, Lordy I love me a good pun and this brand new book by TJR is out of this world. 🚀🌎 The amount of research she had to do to get this just right is staggering and it’s equal parts, thrilling, heartbreaking and endearing. I give this one all the stars ✨ , the moon, 🌙 and the planets 🪐

I love Reid's ability to take things that seem like such niche interests (tennis, NASA scientists) and turn them into books with incredibly wide appeal.

I wouldn't have predicted that I'd be overly interested in a story about the first women who became astronauts with NASA, but the way Reid shared their personal stories, wrapped in the reality of being queer in the early 80s, was really enthralling. I've been lucky to never have to be intentionally closeted, and I hadn't thought too hard about what that reality might be like. Parts of this book were truly heartbreaking as Joan and Vanessa navigated the reality of being deeply in love, but unable to let anyone know.

The multiple timelines worked wonderfully to build suspense and keep me engaged.
I will absolutely be recommending this book to readers at my library.

A deeply felt queer romance set against the sexist and competitive backdrop of a 1980s astronaut space training program. When this beloved author does really well is weaving the narrative through with present-day (meaning 1984) snapshots of a catastrophe unfolding during a mission. That’s the prologue that starts the story. Then we go back in time to see Joan, the protagonist’s, developing voice against all odds during training. She’s a nerd, and shy, but little by little, she becomes more comfortable with who she is, especially once she develops a friendship with Vanessa.

The romantic feelings are really well done here, with a slow burn realization that the “friendship” is transforming into something more. As Joan navigates a turbulent relationship with her sister, a motherly role with her niece, and the overt and covert sexism of the training program, she has to decide what matters to her. What’s really interesting about the snapshots of the mission in peril is that readers have to hold two realities in their heads: watching established characters die while learning about their lives when we flash back into time.

By the time Reid takes us to the boiling point of the romance—and the major dramatic question of whether Joan and Vanessa will risk their careers and reputations by admitting their love to the world in a decidedly non-queer-friendly time and industry, the situation in the present timeline is at a boiling point. Just as Vanessa is about to burn up on atmospheric reentry in the failed mission, we understand the depth of what she means to Joan, who is in the mission control room on the ground. The experience of reading this, which is something we can’t disregard, as writers, was really fun and, by turns, heart-wrenching. The dual timeline structure is the #1 reason this emotional manipulation works (and I say this in a good and meaningful way, as this is one of the goals of writing great, high-stakes fiction).
I won’t spoil the ending but it had me actually gasping, which I can remember doing only a handful of times in my reading life. (And when I sat in a darkened Broadway theater, watching the original cast of Wicked, as Elphaba sang “Defying Gravity” and shot up into the air.) It was such a genuine build-up and release that it’s going to have people raving. While some of the family and career elements might come across as “slow” here, the culmination of the threads is an undeniable fireworks show.

Atmosphere is a well researched, compelling novel that is sure to rocket to the top of the best seller list. And yes, pun intended. At times I did find myself skimming over the technical aspects of the book, though at its heart it is a love story and a book about relationships,set admist the space program of the early 80’s. And how women were the pioneers as the first in NASA’s women astronaut program. The novel opens w a catastrophic accident aboard a space flight. We then flashback to how we got to this mission. Joan and Vanessa were wonderful examples of two women who found each other against all odds, and the challenges they endured when being gay was deemed ‘sexual deviancy’ and could get you expelled from the program. Recommended for all public libraries.

TJR does it again, pulling me out of my reading slump with this gem. Women astronauts? Yes please. A little bit of romance? I'll take it. Her usual writing style that sucks you in and makes you care? Yup. Read this in 3 hours on a plane, no regrets. Pick it up today for sure.

Thank you NetGalley, Random House, and Ms. Reid for the opportunity to read an ARC of this story. An honest review was requested but not required.

First of let me just say how absolutely WILD it is that the 80s are now historical fiction. Yes, I get it, they were 40 years ago, blah blah blah, I am so old, OMG.

For some reason I was really sort of expecting this to be a sort of Carrie Soto meets space: instead of tennis, make it aerospace engineering. I liked that the romance element in Carrie was relatively muted: tennis is Carrie's love and Carrie's life and will always stand before romance or, at the very least, walk hand in hand with it. Which is why I was so surprised that domestic issues and romance played such a big part of Atmosphere. After all, tennis is great and all, but SPACE. Space is so mysterious it's practically impossible: this absolutely foreign and mysterious environment, so difficult to imagine, so far out of reach of 99.999999999999% of people as to be magic. To me, that element is so big (pun intended) that it was hard work to make a romance compete.
And in the 1980s! That boys' club that was (is?) NASA, where "token" women were proffered to the American public as though feminism and women's rights actually mattered to them. What a rich environment for a story. This might be an unpopular opinion; I would have liked even *more* science and engineering details and nitty gritty stuff added in. (I'm that weirdo who read ALL the scientific explanations in The Martian.) I found myself enjoying but skimming the domestic/family bits and the love story, as good as they were. Not say that they weren't very well written; Ms. Reid is a master of characterization and the emotional punch is real. I did struggle with the open-ended ending but, that's me.
Carrie is still my favorite but this was an easy 4 star book for me.

Wow. I was conflicted about my feelings towards this book for the majority of time I spent reading, but the last 10% obliterated me. I was ugly crying for the first time in a while due to a book.

With TJR being one of my favorite authors and having waited so long for her next read, my expectations were probably too high. There was so much scientific and space jargon that I was lost a little bit of the way. And I will admit there were moments while I was reading that I was a little bored and just wanted to know the point of it all.

The point is love. And not your typical love at that. This isn’t a romance. This is a love letter to found family, to your person, to a child who isn’t your own but might as well be and to the things in life bigger than any one person. This is about fighting for what you deserve against all odds, against what society tells you is acceptable. The struggles of being a woman in a man’s world.

The beauty that is TJR is that she will tell you all of this in a slow and mundane way that you won’t even notice what’s happening before your eyes until all the puzzle pieces fall into place and there is a bomb threatening to detonate everything.

While 90% of the book is setting the table and feels a little lackluster just know the last 10% makes the experience beautiful.

Joan teaches physics and astronomy to students at Rice University. She's been obsessed with the stars for as long as she can remember. Her sister discovers NASA is accepting applications for women to join the space program. It's 1980, and Joan’s application is selected from thousands of others. She begins her astronaut training while also meeting and working with some of the people who will change her life forever and make her question her place in the universe.

This book is great. The whole way through, it was a string four starts from me, but the last maybe 25% of it is what kicked it up to five. So many emotions. So many feelings. There were some tears, but not as much as other TJR books have given me. If you're a fan of TJR, you'll notice she still uses all the smallest, yet still significant, details she's known for. There's romance, there's questioning everything you've ever known, there's heartbreak, and there's passion. Passion not just for other people, but space. This book definitely gave me a new perspective on space and how I look at the sky. It's a heartbreaking and beautiful story at the same time.

On a more personal note, there's always something in a TJR book (all the ones I've read so far anyways… I have two left) that somehow mirrors a part of my life, even something very little. In this book it was such a small detail of the theme of the book, but the bigger message is there. It's the weirdest thing. And that's all I'm going to say because I don't want to spoil anything for anyone.

A big thank you to TJR and her team for gifting me this advanced copy. Opinions are my own.

THIS BOOK IS FOR YOU IF: You love TJR!! I also think it would be a good beginner TJR book if I haven't read any of hers yet. Just read it!!

Such a wonderful read. I love that Taylor Jenkins Reid has such a great way of writing characters that a reader can connect to. She is also great at making the reader understand the time and place of the setting. This was a wonderful book and I loved the topic. Her books cover different topics and I have enjoyed each and every one of them.

"I can wake up every single day and choose you, over and over and over again. If you're in bed next to me, I will take your hand. If you are not, I will go find you. I will spend the rest of my life, if I get that lucky, seeking you out. Not because I promised you or because you're there. But because I will want to. I will want to be beside you. Every day. Forever."....
"If that can be enough for you," Vanessa said, "it's yours until the day I die."

This one was hard for me to review. I love TJR and each aspect of this book was really beautiful. But together it felt a bit like too many pieces. The first part was intense and sucked me right into the space drama, so I thought it would be a fast paced read (which I wasn't expecting). Then the book goes back to the story origin and the pace turns a slower corner filled with family drama (that sister is completely awful), society prejudices, 1980s male dominated work culture in a male dominated field, and a heartfelt secret romance. While all these pieces are connected, I think maybe I wanted more of each versus a little bit of all. It made me feel less connected.

The bigger themes of our place in the world, acceptance, and freedom to love are absolutely beautifully portrayed. TJR's writing hits you when you don't expect it. You'll be reading along and then hit something like the quote above --or THAT ENDING, wow--I was in tears.

While there were parts of this I enjoyed, and while I can see how the book will be commercially successful (plus, kudos to the marketing team), this just felt contrived and stilted. "This is how an astronaut feels" "This is a sexual awakening" "This is women's lib!". As a result, the characters and plot stayed very surface level for me.

This is hand down the best book I have read this year.

Joan Goodwin is lots of things to lots of people. A daughter, sister, aunt, friend. She has spent her life doing what is right, what she *should* do, what people need her to do.

But in 1979, Joan does something just for her, for a world bigger than herself. She applies to NASA’s astronaut program, and is chosen to be one of the women working with the space shuttle program. Hoping to be one of the first women in space.

“We are so determined to learn what lies beyond our grasp that we have figured out how to ride a rocket out of the atmosphere. A thrilling ability that seems ripe to attract cowboys, but is best done by people like her. Nerds.” - Atmosphere, Taylor Jenkins Reid

This duel timeline story walks us through a space shuttle mission as it is happening, with Joan as the CAPCOM. And year prior and all events leading up to this pivotal moment.

Atmosphere truly is a love story, a love for a true partner and all of the difficulties that come with navigating a world that puts relationships in a box and isn’t ready to accept anything else. A love for a world beyond the one we stand on, for the sky, the stars, and everything in our solar system and beyond. Also a love for self. Discovering and embracing who you are, not just what you can be for others.

While this space shuttle program is fictional, it’s clearly been so well researched and written to slip easily into our understanding and experience with real space programs. I grew up watching the HBO series “From Earth to the Moon” which is a dramatized telling of the US space program at its various stages. Atmosphere felt like reading those stories of real people who helped advance our journey and exploration of space.

I have said it before in other reviews, but Taylor Jenkins Reid is a mastermind at making these characters come to life and feel all of their emotion. I felt like I intimately knew Joan and Vanessa by the end of the book. More than their story but truly knew *them* and things unsaid.

This is a beautiful story, everyone should read it.

Thank you to Random House Publishing for providing me with an early copy of this book and including me in the Atmosphere Launch Team! All opinions are my own.

✨Atmosphere - Spoiler Free Review✨
By Taylor Jenkins Reid

Genre: Literary Fiction
Format: 📖
Steam: 🌶️
Published: 6/3/25
Publisher: Ballantine Books

Atmosphere tells the story of Joan Goodwin, an astrophysics professor who joins NASA's space shuttle program in the 1980s. As she trains alongside other astronaut candidates, Joan finds unexpected friendship and love, only for a catastrophic event during a mission to dramatically change everything.

Just moments after finishing this incredible story, tears are still streaming down my face! Atmosphere was a profoundly moving experience; a heart-pounding, heart-wrenching, and beautiful exploration of love and passions. Taylor Jenkins Reid has not only met but spectacularly exceeded the hype and anticipation surrounding this novel! I absolutely loved and devoured every page. The narrative masterfully balances heart-stopping suspense with a deeply character-driven plot, interwoven with such a beautiful love story. Its many layers and characters kept me engaged, swooning, and continually learning throughout my read. I previously knew little about space travel, and I found it fascinating to learn about the rigorous selection process, the immense challenges, and the fierce competition involved in becoming an astronaut and being chosen for a mission, especially as a female in the 80’s! This book served as a poignant reminder of the significant strides women and the LGBTQ+ community have made over the past four decades, while also underscoring the crucial work that still lies ahead to secure true equality, particularly in male dominated fields.

The masterful use of a dual timeline enriched the story significantly for me. It added a compelling depth and complexity to the story and the emotions I experienced while reading this book. The narrative structure provided such a profound connection with the characters that, despite not typically crying while reading, I found myself genuinely moved to tears several times throughout my reading. I loved Atmosphere and highly recommend this 5 star read!

🙏 Thank you to Netgalley, Ballantine Books, and Taylor Jenkins Reid for this ARC in exchange for my honest thoughts. Atmosphere publishes 6/3/25. 💖

First off, remember to take everything here with a grain of stardust because I love the NASA/space theme so I’m on board right from the start.

But this book is excellent.

I’ve read Reid several times now and it’s exciting how she can introduce you to characters, make you feel for them (even when they’re not being lovable), connect with them, and root for them hard. This time it’s all against this epic backdrop with stakes that seem higher for it.

Atmosphere is told in a in media res format, so being thrown into a critical juncture in the present is of course an easy way to ratchet tension immediately, but those present timeline scenes were spectacular. Each one gaining significance as the past circumstances lent more weight every time you caught back up.

The leads in Atmosphere were wonderful characters, ones I won’t forget soon. The supporting cast was solid, although there were times I wished they were a little more differentiated. There were also a couple of scenes that slowed the pace of the book by going on a bit long…but really they were decent enough departures. That’s the extent of the bad.

Everything else was a home run. Atmosphere did that great-book-thing where you reread paragraphs because you enjoyed them so much. That thing where you couldn’t wait to turn the page but also didn’t want to because then you’d be closer to not reading it anymore. That thing where you took a breath—or three—because you couldn’t just start another book after reading it. You needed a minute to celebrate or bask or something.

It’s a story about going far and staying close. About reaching the stars and reaching just across the table.

But again, stardust.

I still loved it though.

Recommended for readers who love great writing, meaningful dialogue, insanely cheerable characters and stories where you can find epic meaning in the small and small truths in the epic.

Thank you to Ballantine Books for providing an uncorrected ARC via NetGalley.

I have so many things to say about this book, so apologies for the jumbled paragraphs:

I know absolutely nothing about space. Well, the bare minimum that they taught in 6th grade science classes, but that’s about it. I knew that I loved Taylor Jenkins Reid’s work before this new novel, and so I knew that even if I didn’t understand it, I would be in for a very good story and overall vibe. Luckily, Taylor never fails to disappoint.
Joan is my mother’s name, and she always wished that her middle name was “Frances” so that she could go by that instead. She felt it was such a cool name, so reading this book was a rollercoaster because of that. I love how Taylor can write such beautiful character relationships – even if each character didn’t have a personal relationship with every single major and minor character in the story, it wasn’t faked to try and add dimension to the cast. No one was a villain, at least not entirely, and everyone who could be deemed as such had a understandability to their reasoning. To an extent, that is.
I really do have a lot that I would love to say about this book, but I’m still recovering from it and my thoughts are a bit too all over the place for me to even try and collect them. I loved the characters, I loved Joan’s relationship with Frances, I loved Joan’s character arc, I loved Vanessa, Lydia, Griff, Steve, Donna, Helene, and all of the other characters in this story so much it hurts, and most of all, I love space!

Thank you NetGalley and Ballantine Books for allowing me to read and review such an amazing book, and thank you Taylor Jenkins Reid for taking the time to research, write, and publish the beauty that is Atmosphere.

This book hurt my feelings in the best way possible. I stayed up late to finish it, because the last 20 percent or so was so suspenseful. It's definitely a character driven book, and I enjoyed getting to know each character. I also experienced a ton of space anxiety and confirmed I have zero interest in ever going to space. On the flip side of that, I love how much the characters loved space. Overall, I always love Taylor Jenkins Reid and this book was no exception