58 PUBLISHERS WEEKLY ■ SEPTEMBER 9, 2019
Review_NONFICTION Review_NONFICTIONas “threat simulation theory”—that
nightmares and other anxiety-inducing
dreams allow the brain to practice dealing
with pressure. Provocatively, the theory
holds that dreams can involve, in addition
to recent stresses, “ancestral” memories
from the evolutionarily pivotal Pleistocene
epoch. Explaining that the imagination is
dependent on the brain’s systems for per-
ception and memory, Davies devotes a
good deal of text to laying out how both
systems operate. He also suggests that
simply picturing oneself doing a physically
demanding activity can improve one’s
actual ability, as “much of the mind can’t
tell the difference between what’s real and
what’s imagined”; for the same reason,
computer-generated simulations can also
help. Davies’s knack for translating the
abstract into the tangible—while also
doing justice to the original ideas—will
make this scientific take on imagination
appealing to generalists and specialists
alike. Agent: Don Fehr, Trident Media
Group. (Nov.)Kintsugi: The Japanese Art
of Embracing the Imperfect
and Loving Your Flaws
Tomas Navarro. Sounds True, $17.95 trade
paper (280p) ISBN 978-1-68364-368-5
Psychologist Navarro uses kintsugi, the
Japanese art of honoring the beauty in
broken pottery by fusing the pieces back
together, as a metaphor for personal healing
in his approachable debut. Kintsugi,
Navarro writes, recognizes the “fragility,
strength, and beauty” in the repaired
object, and Navarro has found its basic
principles of close analysis, detailed
planning, and patient rebuilding to be
helpful tools for his patients to process
and move beyond trauma. With lively prose
and many creative analogies (such as the
body being like a “sleeping giant,” having
“everything you need to repair a wound,”
though one’s body “won’t set the process
in motion until you need it”), Navarro
eases the way through the many questions
that structure each section. Weaving in
professional and personal anecdotes, he
considers “repairing” from job loss, low
self-esteem, the loss of love, and the loss of
“hope and joy.” For each situation he offers
advice based on freeing one’s judgment
from guilt and shame, learning from what
happened, and dissociating the negativeWhat do you remember most vividly
about your space walk?
“Walk” is the wrong word for a
zero-gravity space walk. We moved
hand over hand along rails installed
throughout the cargo bay, keeping
our clunky spacesuit boots pointed up
and out of the cargo bay, so as not to
damage anything. When I looked up
at my hands while moving around,
I felt like I was doing a handstand
on the shuttle. The instant I looked
straight ahead, I felt like
I was dangling from the
shuttle. My most vivid
memory is the stunning
view of the Caribbean and
Antilles Islands I saw be-
fore me—not bounded by
any window frame—and
the sight of Venezuela’s
Maracaibo Peninsula slid-
ing between my feet.What did you find chal-
lenging about telling your
story? And what aspects of
it came easily?
The hardest part was figuring out
how to weave in the discussions of
maintenance and invention I wanted
to feature without dragging down
the story line. I wanted to write a
book that would let readers feel like
they were perched on my shoulder
as I lived these events, rather than
like they were in a history class.
My background research was the
easiest. I interviewed a number of
early Team Hubble players. It was
great to reconnect with them, and
I loved learning how the complex
events I took in through my narrowlittle peephole looked to them. Their
stories and archival materials helped
me appreciate how events large and
small that occurred outside my field
of view affected our endeavors. Trac-
ing the origin and evolution of the
idea of on-orbit maintenance became
a fascination.I was amazed by how far in advance
Hubble was planned. Do you believe
such long-term planning is still
feasible for scientific
projects?Scientists and engi-
neers are always
thinking far ahead of
politicians and bud-
geteers. I’m sure
hundreds of good
ideas and preliminary
designs for space mis-
sions or innovations
are simmering right
now in our universi-
ties and companies.
The challenge, as the history of
Hubble reveals, is to find the moment
and the champions who will provide
enough funding to move the ideas off
the drawing board into actual design
development, and then persevere
through refinement, production, and
testing. Small, incremental improve-
ments are easier to understand,
cheaper, and more likely to yield some
gratifyingly tangible benefit in the
near term. Transformational ideas are
riskier and more expensive, but hold
the prospect of paying a much greater
dividend in the long term.
—Lenny Picker[Q&A]
PW Talks with Kathryn D. Sullivan
A Handstand on the Space Shuttle
In Handprints on Hubble: An Astronaut’s Story of Invention
(MIT, Nov.; reviewed on p. 57), Sullivan, the first female astronaut
to do a spacewalk, traces the incredible arc of her career.© debbierowe