Thanks for choosing this book, Whinegums. It arrived just before I went on holiday, so I added it to my already substantial pile.
As you'll see, I had a sneaky peek at this thread before I got the book, just to see if I could guess what it was. When the book arrived, I remembered you and Stickylittlefingers discussing the film, and as a result I put 2 and 2 together and came up with 5 - I had it in my head that it was the story of The Hunt For Red October. So I was really dreading reading it.
However, when I did start, I got into it quite quickly and finished it in a (very wet) day, in a caravan in France.
Coalwood reminded me of the place that all Glaswegian children are taken on a school trip - New Lanark, where social reformer Robert Owen improved the lives of the families who worked in the mill in the early 19th century.
The book brought home to me just how bad conditions were/are for miners - my grandad was a miner for many years, and I don't think I'd ever thought of the logistics of working in a mine, and the truly difficult working conditions. I've since asked my dad about my grandad's job, but he said that he didn't speak about it when he was at home, which says it all really.
Anyway - enough waffle. Although it was a book I'd never pick up (mainly because it's a true story and it's about rockets!) I found myself enjoying the story. I can't imagine the rockets they made - and the technical descriptions didn't help at all - but that side of the story was almost secondary to the main theme of friendship and making your dreams happen.
I thought it was a bit saccharine-sweet and sentimental, and not being American, I probably don't quite get the importance of the whole county science fair thing... The most remarkable thing to me was that Homer Hickman did, indeed, work for NASA as an adult.