Unfortunately, this is not a very honest story about Laika. She may have indeed died sooner than expected due to a malfunction but she would have died anyway as the Soviets had no way of recovering the spacecraft. Laika's imagined rescue by aliens is comforting wishful thinking but seems a cowardly way of sugarcoating the cruel realities. Great illustrations but poor storytelling. See the graphic novel Laika by Nick Abadzis, a much better told and more honest story for an older audience.