This is the perfect place to recommend "History of the Space Shuttle, Volume Two: Development of the Space Shuttle, 1972-1981" by T. A. Heppenheimer. An excelle

This is the perfect place to recommend "History of the Space Shuttle, Volume Two: Development of the Space Shuttle, 1972-1981" by T. A. Heppenheimer. An excellent account of a nation-scale engineering project and all the myriad engineering, economic, infrastructure, political, and project management pieces that go into it. Eye opening if you've never been involved in true mega-scale projects. There's also "Space Shuttle Decision, 1965-1972 (History of the Space Shuttle, Volume 1", but I think Volume 2 is far more interesting from an engineering point of view.