About this Event
On Saturday, February 7, 2026, from 7:00pm to 10:00pm, come to a special Valentine’s-themed after-hours experience celebrating love, science, and Taylor Jenkins Reid’s #1 New York Times bestselling novel Atmosphere—a story of women astronauts and queer romance set in the 1980s NASA program.
Your ticket includes a hardcover copy of and two drink tickets (with additional drinks and snacks available for purchase), as well as:
- Special after-hours access to all of Adler Planetarium's exhibits
- A custom Atmosphere dome sky show, feating shifting celestial projections paired with quotes from the novel, attendee-submitted love notes, and audiobook narration by Julia Whelan.
- Astrology readings from Chicago practitioners Jake Mayfield and Annie Hex
- Free guided tours led by an Adler expert
In addition to after-hours access to all of Adler Planetarium’s exhibits, guests will experience a custom Atmosphere dome sky show, featuring shifting celestial projections paired with quotes from the novel, attendee-submitted love notes, and audiobook narration by Julia Whelan.
Plus, the evening includes free astrology readings from Chicago practitioners Jake Mayfield and Annie Hex, along with free guided tours of —a special exhibition exploring how astronomy and astrology were once entwined and shaped our understanding of the sky.
Attendees are encouraged to bring their own blankets for indoor stargazing!
ABOUT THE BOOK
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK • From the author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones & The Six comes an epic new novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s space shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go to live and love beyond our limits.
Joan Goodwin has been obsessed with the stars for as long as she can remember. Thoughtful and reserved, Joan is content with her life as a professor of physics and astronomy at Rice University and as aunt to her precocious niece, Frances. That is, until she comes across an advertisement seeking the first women scientists to join NASA’s space shuttle program. Suddenly, Joan burns to be one of the few people to go to space.
Selected from a pool of thousands of applicants in the summer of 1980, Joan begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates: Top Gun pilot Hank Redmond and scientist John Griffin, who are kind and easygoing even when the stakes are highest; mission specialist Lydia Danes, who has worked too hard to play nice; warmhearted Donna Fitzgerald, who is navigating her own secrets; and Vanessa Ford, the magnetic and mysterious aeronautical engineer, who can fix any engine and fly any plane.
As the new astronauts become unlikely friends and prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined. In this new light, Joan begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her place in the observable universe.
Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, it all changes in an instant.
Fast-paced, thrilling, and emotional, Atmosphere is Taylor Jenkins Reid at her best: transporting readers to iconic times and places, creating complex protagonists, and telling a passionate and soaring story about the transformative power of love—this time among the stars.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Adler Planetarium, 1300 South DuSable Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, United States
USD 55.20
