She barely sleeps, has preternaturally thick skin, wears patent leather boots that put Wonder Woman’s to shame, and is so tough that she’s been known to eat bees (and the occasional elementary school principal). In a few short months, the most controversial public school reformer in the country will move to Sacramento where, in an order known only to her, she plans to launch a national education initiative, raise one billion dollars, forever change the face of schools in America and marry our mayor. Who is Michelle Rhee and why can’t anyone agree if she’s a superhero to our kids or just one very smiley villainess?

In 2005, while tethered to a robotic arm 220 miles above the surface of the Earth, Sacramento native and UC Davis grad Stephen Robinson made one of the most famous—and dangerous—spacewalks inhistory. His mission: to remove debris from heat tiles on the belly of the Space Shuttle to prevent the craft from burning up on re-entry. On Feb. 7, our hometown astronaut returns to space for his fourth, and likely last, NASA voyage. He’s living proof why, yes, sometimes it really does take a rocket scientist.

It’s been 20 years since Sacramento’s most notorious murderer, Dorothea Puente, buried seven bodies in the garden of her F Street boardinghouse. Now 80, she speaks out in a series of rare interviews on her crimes, her “relationships” with the Kennedys and the Reagans and why—in the end—the person she really wanted to kill was herself