Why does the author choose to present the events of the story in an episodic style?

Presenting the events in order keeps the reader from learning too much at the beginning.

Explanation:

the author obviously wanted it to be some tension/suspense before the audience figuring out the whole plot.

the apollo program, also known as project apollo, was the third united states human spaceflight program carried out by the national aeronautics and space administration (nasa), which succeeded in landing the first humans on the moon from 1969 to 1972.

lemme actually be useful and say i believe the answer is the first one.