Chris Hadfield – Author Biography
Early Life
Chris Hadfield was born on August 29, 1959, in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada, and raised on a corn farm. He decided to become an astronaut at age nine, watching the Apollo 11 moon landing on television. He earned an engineering degree from the Royal Military College of Canada, became a Royal Canadian Air Force fighter pilot, and later earned a master’s in aviation systems from the University of Tennessee.
Career
Selected by the Canadian Space Agency in 1992, Hadfield flew three space missions: STS-74 (1995), STS-100 (2001) — during which he performed two spacewalks to install the Canadarm2 — and Expedition 34/35 (2012–2013), when he became the first Canadian commander of the International Space Station. From orbit he became a global celebrity, posting stunning Earth photos and recording the first music video made in space — a cover of David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.” After retiring from the CSA in 2013, he wrote the bestselling memoir An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth (2013) and turned to fiction with the thriller The Apollo Murders (2021), an alternate-history Cold War space-race murder mystery praised for its technical authenticity. Its sequel, The Defector (2023), continued the series.
Major Works
An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth (2013), You Are Here: Around the World in 92 Minutes (2014), the children’s book The Darkest Dark (2016), The Apollo Murders (2021), The Defector (2023).
Writing Style and Themes
Hadfield writes with an astronaut’s precision and a storyteller’s warmth. His memoir distilled spaceflight into life lessons — “sweat the small stuff,” prepare for the worst, earn your place. His fiction applies the same authenticity to thrillers: every technical detail of the Apollo program is correct, which makes the alternate-history twists feel chillingly plausible. His themes are preparation, humility, teamwork, and wonder.
Legacy
Hadfield is the most famous astronaut of the social media age — “the first to truly bring space down to Earth,” as admirers put it. He made spaceflight feel personal for millions and proved that a test pilot could also be a bestselling author.
