Mark Kelly spent his career flying 39 naval combat tours in Operation Desert Storm followed by a stint as an astronaut where he flew on four shuttle missions. Now the husband of former US Representative Gabrielle Giffords is trying his hand at writing children’s books.
Appearing on FOX News , Kelly says he was inspired to write Mousetronaut after he took mice into space for research purposes. Kelly says of the experience:
“On my first space flight I carried up some mice and I got the idea from one of them. I didn’t do anything about it for a very long time because I was busy flying the space shuttle.”
Kelly also explains his decision to write a children’s book instead of a memoir:
“Why a children’s book? Because education is the most important thing I think we do in this country. It touches everything, and to have good books that will interest kids at a young age that they’ll read is really important, and kids tend to be interested space and in animals.”
That’s not to say Kelly won’t write his memoir; the former astronaut has plenty of time on his hands now that he retired from NASA in October 2011. Although, Mark Kelly has admitted that his main focus is on wife Gabrielle Giffords , who was nearly killed during a January 2011 assassination attempt.
In his free time, Kelly is consulting and doing some public speaking but says:
“My primary role is to make sure Gabby has everything she needs … Just making sure she’s all taken care of, that’s my no. 1 job.”
Will you be picking up a copy of Mousetronaut ?
