Sex on the Moon: The Amazing Story Behind the Most Audacious Heist in History [Hardcover]

Ben Mezrich (Author)

Book Description

Release date: July 12, 2011

Thad Roberts, a fellow in a prestigious NASA program had an idea—a romantic, albeit crazy, idea. He wanted to give his girlfriend the moon. Literally.
 
Thad convinced his girlfriend and another female accomplice, both NASA interns, to break into an impregnable laboratory at NASA—past security checkpoints, an electronically locked door with cipher security codes, and camera-lined hallways—and help him steal the most precious objects in the world: the moon rocks.
 
But what does one do with an item so valuable that it’s illegal even to own? And was Thad Roberts—undeniably gifted, picked for one of the most competitive scientific posts imaginable, a possible astronaut—really what he seemed?
 
Mezrich has pored over thousands of pages of court records, FBI transcripts, and NASA documents and has interviewed most of the participants in the crime to reconstruct this Ocean’s Eleven–style heist, a madcap story of genius, love, and duplicity that reads like a Hollywood thrill ride.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Best Books of the Month, July 2011: In this true story of love and adventure, nothing can stop Thad Roberts from keeping a promise to his girlfriend Rebecca--not even NASA security. When he's in the lab, Roberts is a brilliant NASA co-op intern, but the other interns know him better for devising thrill-seeking activities, like cliff diving and sneaking into the shuttle simulator. When he realizes that scientists consider moon rocks worthless once they’ve been in experiments, Roberts starts to wonder… if they’re worthless, how could stealing them be wrong? Ben Mezrich, author of The Accidental Billionaires (which inspired the movie The Social Network), starts each section with excerpts of Roberts’s love letters to Rebecca from prison, providing a love-drunk context for Roberts’ journey as the moon rock heist balloons from idle fantasy to stark reality. Behind-the-scenes looks at NASA’s Johnson Space Center and thriller-like action that ranges from the U.S. to Belgium make for an enthralling read for anyone who ever dreamed about being an astronaut--or promised to give someone else the moon. --Malissa Kent

Review

"[M]ovie-worthy treatment to the guy who stole moon rocks from NASA"--The New York Daily News

"[An] in-depth look at Thad Roberts, who along with three other NASA interns, stole pieces of lunar rock to impress his girlfriend. Mezrich has done extensive research to recreate the story of how an aspiring astronaut ended up getting caught for stealing over 100 pieces of the moon."--The Atlantic Monthly

"[Mezrich is] a genius at using characters and dialogue....to turn nonfiction into something as compelling as any thriller."--The Chronicle Herald

"In Sex on the Moon, author Ben Mezrich details the riveting account of how one of the most improbable heists in history went down....a fast and furious read, powered along by Mezrich’s desire never to take his eyes off the story."
--Chicago Post-Tribune

"[A]n out-of-this-world heist"--USA Today

"Ben Mezrich’s latest straight-to-the-big-screen book....fascinating protagonist.....[Mezrich is] an accomplished storyteller.....a rollicking summertime page-turner crackling with sex, astronauts, stolen dinosaur bones and international cyber-intrigue"--The Miami Herald

"A breathless, credulous style....memorable supporting characters....adventure, sex, romance, a hero who is equal parts Clifford Irving from The Hoax, Frank Abagnale from Catch Me If You Can, and George Bailey from It’s a Wonderful Life,....entertaining"--The Boston Globe

" [A] thrilling account of space rock heist...fun, breezy action"--Tampa Tribune

"Eloquent prose and a direct view into the characters’ mind...the access to Roberts and re-creation of his motivation and personality are Sex On The Moon’s best qualities."
--The Onion

"[A] fascinating story....has the readability of popular fiction, a ripping story, and great characters....Another winner from an extremely talented writer"--Booklist, starred review

"Mezrich has uncovered another high-stakes, fascinating true story....part love story, part madcap caper, part astro-geekery, the book is one of the summer's most fun reads."--NPR

"Out of this world heist...one of the summer's most buzzed-about books"--CNN.com

"Page-turner....engaging read."--San Antonio Express-News

"Ben Mezrich, the gonzo-inspired biographer of Ivy League geeks.....[brings us a] stranger-than-fiction, true-life thriller of a man who went where no man has gone before....[the] story ticked all the boxes: a charismatic dreamer with a troubled past, a Romeo-and-Juliet love story, a geek-alicious high-tech setting, an ingenious Oceans 11-style heist—and perhaps the most boneheaded mistake any man ever made to impress a girl. Even better, it was a journalist’s Holy Grail: a truly uncovered story."--Book Page

"Deliciously readable"--Baltimore Jewish Times

"Ben Mezrich goes to incredible lengths to bring readers a story that is both accurate and spellbinding, honest and riveting"--Portsmouth Wire

"A pulse-pounding tale"--Patriot Ledger

"This is the incredible story of a crime truly out of this world, told with verve by Mezrich"--News of the World

"Compelling"--Atlanta Jewish Times

"[E]nthusiastically re-creates this oddball 2002 moon-rock heist"--Kirkus Reviews

Praise for The Accidental Billionaires, the basis of the Oscar-winning film The Social Network

“Uproarious . . . stimulating enough to keep even the un-medicated narcoleptic awake.”
— Washington Times

“Mezrich’s prose has a cinematic flavor.”
— Boston Globe

“You won’t be able to put the book down. The story’s far too compelling, and entirely too personal, to toss aside.”
— Oregonian

“High-octane page-turners, replete with sex, skullduggery, and plot twists worthy of James Patterson.”
—New York Times

“The book is better; you should read the book.”
—Alex Rodriguez

“You know you’re onto something when Hollywood calls before your book is even out.”
—Entertainment Weekly

“Sizzling . . . Mezrich’s pop narrative reveals an American public greedy to read about the most intimate details of the sex, money, and betrayal in Facebook’s formative history . . . energetic.”
— Telegraph

“Mezrich paints a story of backstabbing, wild sex, hard drinking, and, at one stage, feasting on roasted koala on a yacht owned by a Silicon Valley millionaire.”
—Guardian

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Doubleday; First Edition edition (July 12, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385533926
• ISBN-13: 978-0385533928
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 1.2 x 9.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (113 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #289,799 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I'm the author of nine books, at the moment, including Bringing Down The House, The True Story of Six MIT kids Who Took Vegas- which sort of made me a vegas expert. I live in Boston with my fiance and pug, Bugsy.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

107 of 115 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Second-rate story, third-rate writing July 28, 2011

By Gary Schroeder

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is a manuscript for a movie. In recent interviews Ben Mezrich has been very open about that. He writes books from the very beginning in the hopes that they will be optioned for movies. And it shows.

Mezrich, author of "The Accidental Billionaires," the book upon which the Facebook movie "The Social Network" was based, went in search of his next great true-story thriller. What he settled on was the tale of Thad Roberts, a student enrolled in NASA's Cooperative Education Program who turned thief and decided to steal moon rocks and sell them online for easy cash. The story behind "Sex on the Moon" (itself an awful title) is hyberbolically subtitled "the Most Audacious Heist in History." Roberts' theft is by no means entitled to such an exciting description. The heist itself was fairly uncomplicated and involved nothing more than a clever use of chemical dust to break an electronic combination lock and some elbow grease to drag a safe out of a room and into a car. The only thing remotely remarkable about the theft is that actual moon rocks are involved. Had Roberts stolen terrestrial gem stones, he would have warranted nothing more than a mention in the local news paper police blotter. Mezrich has to work hard -- very hard -- to fill this thin conceit with enough volume to fill a book.

And then there's the writing. Which is awful. This is some of the most hackneyed, rigid, trite prose I've ever read. Some examples: "she had given him her number. It had been like rocket fuel in his bathing-suit all the way home" or "sooner or later, the truth would be as clear as the tattoo on her thigh" or "Thad only knew for sure what he was feeling. Which was beyond anything he could remember feeling before" or "suddenly, reality hit him like a Saturn V rocket to the face." Ugh.

Mezrich also seems to have a writing tick in which he is compelled to start sentences with "Hell,..." as in "Hell, the guy was really making a scene", "Hell, he was beginning to feel loose", "Hell, maybe they'd all end up visiting that pristine beach", "Hell, maybe the need to apologize went even further back", etc., etc. This became almost comical as the pages wore on.

I have to hold the editor(s) of this book responsible for this. I don't think they read this book. Here's some zingers they let slip through: "Matt had remembered Thad as the brilliant kind in physics classes who was willing to go further and think freer than anyone else." Think "freer"? Describing an unpleasant scene inside a federal prison Mezrich writes "there was such an undercurrent of anger and subverted violence in that place." "Subverted" violence? Could he have meant submerged or supressed? In another chapter, he refers to the "infamous orange soil" collected by the Apollo astronauts. Okay, that soil was certainly _famous_, but "infamous"? Someone needs to check the dictionary.

This is a lousy book undeserving of your time. Buy something else.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Not an amazing story August 12, 2011

By C. Callahan

Format:Hardcover

An inside look at NASA, stolen moon rocks, an international team working to recover the goods, sex, interns, prison....how did this story turn out to be boring? Whatever the reason, boring is how it turned out.

Maybe there just wasn't enough material to fill a book about this case. Plus, in spite of his desire to make himself into a larger-than-life character, Thad really isn't one. Instead he's more of a pathetic loser who throws away everything he worked for and disappoints so many people in an attempt to re-make himself.

Dull, slow, only occasionally interesting, and the only characters you really care for get treated badly.

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Where's a Good Dope Slap When You Need One? November 23, 2011

By Michele Kingery

Format:Hardcover

And Thad Roberts really needed one. He is one of those poor slobs for whom the magnetic pull of self-destruction is as irresistible as a Siren's song. (Darwin would have had a field day with that.). At least Odysseus had the smarts to order his sailors to lash him to the mast and stuff wax in their ears. Roberts wasn't nearly as prudent, though he was certainly smart.

Booted from the family fold for the unforgivable sin of engaging in pre-marital sex, Roberts claws his way up from the depths of despair to earn a prestigious internship at NASA only to blow it trying to pull off one of the most cockamamie scams in modern history; stealing moon rocks.

Really?

That Roberts even got to NASA in the first place was something of a miracle. How a broke, disenfranchised kid managed to rack up the pre-recs for a shot at the big time is one question I still had at the end of the book. Roberts takes courses in physics, geology, anthropology, Russian and Japanese. He obtains a pilot's license. He learns to scuba dive. He completes a charity bike ride for cystic fibrosis and raises $10,000. That accomplishment seems to be what cinches his entry into the Johnson Space Center at Houston, where he spends three semesters glad-handing his fellow interns and trolling in and out of various labs and simulators with the James Bond theme song playing in his head.

Ego issues? Possibly.

Roberts also has a wife back in Utah. Something he doesn't hide, but doesn't exactly advertise. It wouldn't mesh with the ultra-cool, geek-meets-Mission Impossible persona he's created, the same persona that attempts a ridiculous, bumbling moon rock heist that ultimately does earn him a dope slap from the universe in the form of an eight year prison sentence.

Writer Ben Mezrich does an nice job nailing the zeitgeist of NASA, at least from Roberts' perspective, which brings me to the big question I had with this book. Are the thoughts in Roberts' head, his, or Mezrich's "interpretation" of them? There is a sort of contrived feel to expressions like "Thad swelled with pride", etc. The third person narration makes this book read like a hybrid of memoir, biography and creative non-fiction. My rat-like mind was scrabbling for a label(still is) and I had to push that aside (as best I could) in order to just enjoy the story.

Sex On The Moon is an enjoyable read. Having grown up in the era of space exploration, it was interesting to get an "insider's" view into one facet of NASA. As for Thad Roberts, hopefully he's learned a lesson and been able to piece his life back together.

But moon rocks?

Thad, what the heck were ya' thinkin'?!