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Summary: Wonderful Reading!
Review: A wonderful story with history and life mixed together. Well written and insightful. Told in a simple manner by a man honest with himself and others. Hard times can make good people. And hard lessons can make good pilots. Buy this book and deliver the mail in icy weather without radar or sometimes even hope. Deliver war material anywhere in the world. A single mistake can be your last. Even if you don't care about airplanes- read this book. He will tell you about people- and yourself.
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Summary: required reading for the aviator or really just anyone
Review: Being a fan of aviation and spending a great deal of my time reading about various pilots and aircraft, it is without a doubt easy to confess that FATE IS THE HUNTER is one of the most interesting books I have ever read. Probably one of the greatest things about this book is that you really do not have to know a lot about aviation to really understand it. While it is true that Gann writes in a style that is somewhat different from most of the more contemporary writers, it can still be said that the way that he tells this story is will entertain, inform and captivate who ever reads it. Probably the most unique thing about this book is that you do not have to know much about aviation to appreciate and enjoy it. Infact, just about anyone who has been in an aircraft can and most likely will find this story at the least appreciable and at the most an eye opener to the world of commercial aviation and the courages pioneers of commercial flight who insticts and abilities are seldom matched by todays standards. Those who have read this book know what I speak of and to those who have not read it I strongly recommend it. The pilots, the planes and the elements of flight have never been described the they have been in FATE IS THE HUNTER. Read it, enjoy it and appreciate it.
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Summary: An essential for any aviation enthusiast
Review: Fate Is The Hunter is pilot Ernie Gann's vivid collection of aviation experiences set in the early days of commercial air travel. From a sabotaged engine over the jungles of South America, to sudden death in a farmer's field in Ontario, Canada Gann catalogues flying in a way I often found myself thinking, "I wish I could have said it like that!" In fact, I couldn't put the nearly 200-page book down until I'd finished it 18 hours later--and only then with a regretful sigh because there wasn't more. This book is a must for any aviation enthusiast.
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Summary: Easily the best book I've ever read!
Review: First off, I am an aviation nut. I am a student pilot and aspiring ATP. For me, finding a good book let alone a good aviation book is nearly impossible. So many books are chocked full of technicalities that I either already know or don't care about. Finding a truly interesting aviation book is a rare treat. After about 2 pages of 'Fate is the Hunter' I was truly hooked. This book puts you right in the cockpit with Mr. Gann as you venture the world from the start of his flying career on the DC-2 to flying across the endless Pacific during WWII when airlines were called to help the war effort. Mr. Gann is truly a talented writer and in my opinion one of the best in Aviation right up with St Ex. If you are as engrossed in aviation as I am, this is one book you wont want to put down and will wish would never end.
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Summary: Required reading!
Review: For those of us who fly professionally, and for those hope to one day do so, this book is a must-read!Capt. Gann and those aviators of his time were fearless (or nuts!) by todays standards. We owe them a great deal.
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Summary: My Great-Grandfather Knew Him
Review: I am finally reading this book, after so many people in my family, both flying and non-flying, have. This book is almost a mecca for us, because it mentions my great-grandfather, Thomas J. Reid, who died in 1952 when the instrument approach to Newark went down, and he ended up in an Elizabeth, NJ, apartment complex. I now appreciate the kind of conditions my grandfather must have flown in, and can only hope that he is looking down on my own beloved brother, who has himself chosen a career as an airline pilot. But as a reminder, almost all of us have the same picture, framed somewhere in our houses: a picture of T.J. Reid in his uniform.
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Summary: Plane Truth
Review: I am pleased to see that people are still reading this wonderful book; it has long been one of my favorites. Author Ernest K. Gann is probably better known for his novels, esp. THE HIGH AND THE MIGHTY, but FATE IS THE HUNTER is non-fiction, an autobiography of Gann's career as a commercial pilot. It has many memorable anecdotes and people from the early days--1930's and 40's--of aviation. We meet Hughen, a captain who brought an ice-laden DC-2 to a safe landing, and Ross, who gave the rookie Gann self-confidence by sharing take-offs and landings 50-50, regardless of weather or mechancial problems. This is a book that really takes you "inside the cockpit". Take your seat, and fasten your seatbelt. This is a "flight" you will long remember.
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Summary: The most exciting and inspiring book I have ever read.
Review: I have read and re-read "Fate is the Hunter" so many times that the pages are loose and falling out. You are not just reading the best aviation book of all time, you are in the cockpit behind the master himself, as he savors the illicit thrill of a zero-zero takeoff from a fog bound Presque Isle airport in a C-47 during the war, taking a load of steel girders to Goose Bay. Just after takeoff, the girders break loose and slide to the rear of the aircraft, which starts a climb so steep that the plane is shuddering in a stall. As Gann and his co-pilot are pushing the control column forward as hard as they can with their feet a crewmember is trying to move the girders back up the near vertical floor. Gann's writing so inspired me that I wanted to become an airline pilot, but my flying ability was just slightly better than Bixby, his inept co-pilot that almost collided with the Taj Mahal, another fascinating story later on in the book. I became a dispatcher instead, an occupation I truly loved, which was also inspired by Gann's interaction with the dispatchers of his line. I wrote Ernest Gann at his home in Friday Harbor, Washington and tried to convey just how much I enjoyed "Fate is the Hunter" and what an impact it made on my life. I received short note from him. It was very gracious and humble, and is one of my greatest treasures. I also highly recommend "Hostage to Fortune", a chronology of Gann's incredible life from a rebellious young man that could never follow his father into business and be chained to an office, through a lifetime of adventure, to his retirement on Red Mill Farm, on an island in the Pacific northwest.
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Summary: Nostalgia and inspiration
Review: I read this book when i was in my teens, and years later, after my copy finally succumbed to old age and hundreds of turns of the page, I wanted to read it one more time. What a glorious, inspiring book, taking us back to a romantic time in flight; when flying by the seat of your pants really meant something, and when the glories of an America in transition were more clearly evident from the air than from anywhere else. The book is Gann's loving tribute to the brutes he flew, but it also is a hark-back to a time when automation had not yet dulled our senses, and when the coda of soaring above the clouds was humbled by the fate that is constantly our hunter. Beautifully written, its a must-read, whether or not you're into flying.
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Summary: My Great-Grandfather Knew Him
Review: I'm amazed that so many of my friends who are military and/or commercial pilots don't know of this book. This book should be every pilot's bible. Epic stories about flying mail in pre-war NE U.S., and then overseas during WWII. Thumb's up all the way.. a must for aviators. Mike Zinsley
author of The Rapture of the Deep
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