2017 Aviation Reading List

[Lotro]

'Tis the season for commitment!

This year, I intend to fly more (seriously), drink more water (I say that every year), and spend less time reading AvCanada rants and more time reading aviation books. Here's what's on my list, what's on yours?

Forever Flying by R.A. "Bob" Hoover - I just started this, it's lighthearted and an incredible tale.

Stick and Rudder by Wolfgang Langewiesche - I tried reading this once and found it tough, but I'm going to try again.

The Compleat Taildragger Pilot by Harvey S. Plourde - I'm told this is a must-read for those who drag tail, or want to.

Flight of Passage: A True Story by Rinker Buck - This is a classic aviation story. Read it for inspiration to get started flying.

Wind, Sand and Starts by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry - Forget "The Little Prince"! He was an aviator 1st, a children's author second.

Immortal Beaver: The World's Greatest Bush Plane by Sean Rossiter - Part textbook, part coffee table book, all beaver!

At the rate I read, these six titles will take me well into 2020, but I'd love to know what you think might be missing.

~Lotro

[gwagen]

God is my Co-Pilot
By Col Robert L Scott

If you like Hoovers story you'll enjoy this one as well.

Well worth a read

[loopy]

Consider West With the Night by Beryl Markham. It's a memoir and stunningly well written. She was a daughter of British parents born and raised in Kenya and grew up running around and in the bush with the local tribes. She speaks of Africa in a captivating way. Then there's the flying adventure. She was the woman aviation pioneer that history forgot in the shadow of Amelia Earhart.

There's also a biography entitled "StraightOn Till Morning".

She was the first woman to fly east to west across the Atlantic and only the second to do it. From Wikipedia:

Markham's memoir lingered in obscurity until 1982, when California restaurateur George Gutekunst read a collection of Ernest Hemingway's letters, including one in which Hemingway lavishly praised Markham's writing (if not Markham herself):

“ "Did you read Beryl Markham's book, West with the Night? ...She has written so well, and marvelously well, that I was completely ashamed of myself as a writer. I felt that I was simply a carpenter with words, picking up whatever was furnished on the job and nailing them together and sometimes making an okay pig pen. But this girl, who is to my knowledge very unpleasant and we might even say a high-grade bitch, can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves as writers ... it really is a bloody wonderful book." ”
Intrigued, Gutekunst read West with the Night and became so enamored of Markham's prose that he helped persuade a California publisher, North Point Press, to re-issue the book in 1983. The re-release of the book launched a remarkable final chapter in the life of the eighty-year-old Markham, who was lauded for her three final years as a great author as well as flyer.

[ThatArmyGuy]

"Test Pilots in Action: The Chosen Ones" by Sean Rossiter. A collection of historical accounts of some of our favorite planes built my A.V. Roe Canada and DeHavilland Canada.

[anibalb]

I would add Fate is the Hunter by Ernest K Gann. It describes early commercial flying in the mid 30s with DC 3s, C-87s and DC 4s among others.
The descriptions of flying on northern Canada and across the Atlantic and the life of commercial pilots are impressive. It´s one of those few books that get better and better the more times you read them.

[DHC-1 Jockey]

Bush Pilot With a Briefcase - The Incredible Story of Aviation Pioneer by Grant McConachie

The DeHavilland Canada DHC-1 Chipmunk - The Poor Man's Spitfire by Shields, Goncalves, Brown and Blievers
- Insert shameless plug here as I'm related to one of the authors

[geodoc]

.

[planett]

1) Also promoting "Fate is the Hunter". Can never have too much "Ross and the matches" or "it was raining like a cow pissing on a flat rock" or Taj Mahal.

2) Tony Kern aviation safety texts on "Airmanship" are superb.

3) 747 by Joe Sutter, (RIP) chief engineer on Boeing's.......you guessed it.

4) The Joy of Painting with Bob Ross..........wait, just a relaxing video.

[Scout44]

I haven't picked it up in a while, but I enjoyed "Fly the Engine" by Kas Thomas.

[Ki-ll]

All excellent titles above. I'll add "The Road to 707" by William H. Cook and "The Avro Canada C-102 Jetliner" by Jim Floyd.

[g5]

Another vote for Fate is the Hunter.

I also enjoyed the Accidental Airline. (Spilsbury)

First Light (Wellum)

Last of the Bush Pilots ( Helmericks)

As for my wish list I have

Flying for Freedom (siska)

A thousand Shall Fall (Peden)

Malta Spitfire (beurling)

[B208]

Stranger to the Ground: Richard Bach

[pelmet]

Current book on the read right now is called "Testing Death" by George Marrett. Much of it is his experience as a civilian test pilot at Hughes Airport in Culver City. The airport was between LAX and Santa Monica. A lot of talk about missiles if you like that as that kind of stuff as it was the specialty of the company.

I only got his books because I happened to go to a speech by him in Bakersfield a few years back. A few interesting things in the book. Not gripping but just what I happen to be reading right now.

Unfortunately, my library has gotten very big and I have only read a few of them. I don't think I will ever catch up.

[DanWEC]

A good read is Into The Abyss, which chronicles the Piper Navajo crash in High Prairie, that killed 6 people- including Grant Notley, the current AB premier's father.
A true story, it paints a tragic picture of pilot fatigue and exhausting duty regulations.

[oldtimer]

One must never forget that masterpiece "DownEast International Airlines, Ace McCool, The Airways Master"

[Panama Jack]

If you ever have trouble falling asleep at night, may I recommend the classic "Handling the Big Jets" by D. Davies. It is the stuff that awakens the lurid fantasies of Cathay Pacific pilots.

[kvny16r]

Le Grand Cirque by Closterman.....I don't know if there's an english version though..

[7ECA]

Le Grand Cirque by Closterman.....I don't know if there's an english version though..

There is, it's called "The Big Show". Another good read about the wartime experience of a pilot.

[Jorrian]

Finished reading The Killing Zone: How and Why Pilots Die. The book is geared towards new pilots in the area of 50 - 350 hours; chapters are based on accident reports (IMC, fuel starvation, lack of planning, weather). Being a 70 hour pilot it opened up my mind on the "what could happen" moments with accident analysis and was an easy read.

[anibalb]

If you like military aviation there's a bunch of good books:
-Fighter pilot by Robin Olds about flying fighters in WW2 and Vietnam
-Samurai by Saburo Sakai, a japanese pilot in WW2
-Yeager by . Yeager

And my three favorites because of their historic value but also because they are fun to read:
-Chickenhawk by Robert Mason about flying UH-1 helicopters in Vietnam
-Rolling Thunder and Palace Cobra by Ed Rasimus, they are two different books, the first one on his tour flying F105 in Vietnam and the second flying F-4s in the same war.
Highly recomended all.