Fate is the Hunter

Description

FATE IS THE HUNTER is a fascinating and thrilling account of some of the more memorable experiences Ernest K Gann had in the air. He's flown in both peace and war and come close to death many times. Here he reveals the characters he's known and the dramas he's experienced, portraying fate (or death) as a hunter constantly in pursuit of pilots. This is a fabulous account of both the history of aviation and one man's life in the air.

Ernest K Gann graduated from Culver Military Academy (now Culver Academies) in 1930. He flew for American Airlines and then the US Army during World War II. He lived in Washington and wrote and published prolifically.

"Chicago Sunday Tribune" This purely wonderful autobiographical volume is the best thing on flying and the meaning of flying that we have had since Antoine de Saint-Exupery took us aloft on his winged prose in the late 1930s and early 1940s....It is a splendid and many-faceted personal memoir that is not only one man's story but the story, in essence, of all men who fly. "New York Times Book Review" Few writers have ever drawn their readers so intimately into the shielded sanctum of the cockpit, and it is here that Mr. Gann is truly the artist. "Saturday Review" This fascinating, well-told autobiography is a complete refutation of the comfortable cliche that "man is master of his fate." As far as pilots are concerned, fate (or death) is a hunter who is constantly in pursuit of them....There is nothing depressing about "Fate Is the Hunter." There is tension and suspense in it but there is great humor too. Happily, Gann never gets too technical for the layman to understand. "The New Yorker" This book is an episodic log of some of the more memorable of [the author's] nearly ten thousand hours aloft in peace and (as a member of the Air Transport Command) in war. It is also an attempt to define by example his belief in the phenomenon of luck -- that "the pattern of anyone fate is only partly contrived by the individual." Cornelius Ryan author of "A Bridge Too Far" and "The Longest Day Fate Is the Hunter" is partly autobiographical, partly a chronicle of some of the most memorable and courageous pilots the reader will ever encounter in print; and always this book is about the workings of fate....The book is studded with characters equally as memorable as the dramas they act out. V.S. Pritchett "New Statesman" Mr. Gann is a writer saturated in his subject; he has the skill to make every instant sharp and important and we catch the fever to know that documentary writing does not often invite. "Chicago Sunday Tribune"This purely wonderful autobiographical volume is the best thing on flying and the meaning of flying that we have had since Antoine de Saint-Exupery took us aloft on his winged prose in the late 1930s and early 1940s....It is a splendid and many-faceted personal memoir that is not only one man's story but the story, in essence, of all men who fly. "New York Times Book Review"Few writers have ever drawn their readers so intimately into the shielded sanctum of the cockpit, and it is here that Mr. Gann is truly the artist. "Saturday Review"This fascinating, well-told autobiography is a complete refutation of the comfortable cliche that "man is master of his fate." As far as pilots are concerned, fate (or death) is a hunter who is constantly in pursuit of them....There is nothing depressing about "Fate Is the Hunter." There is tension and suspense in it but there is great humor too. Happily, Gann never gets too technical for the layman to understand. "The New Yorker"This book is an episodic log of some of the more memorable of [the author's] nearly ten thousand hours aloft in peace and (as a member of the Air Transport Command) in war. It is also an attempt to define by example his belief in the phenomenon of luck -- that "the pattern of anyone fate is only partly contrived by the individual." Cornelius Ryanauthor of "A Bridge Too Far" and "The Longest DayFate Is the Hunter" is partly autobiographical, partly a chronicle of some of the most memorable and courageous pilots the reader will ever encounter in print; and always this book is about the workings of fate....The book is studded with characters equally as memorable as the dramas they act out. V.S. Pritchett"New Statesman"Mr. Gann is a writer saturated in his subject; he has the skill to make every instant sharp and important and we catch the fever to know that documentary writing does not often invite. "Chicago Sunday Tribune"This purely wonderful autobiographical volume is the best thing on flying and the meaning of flying that we have had since Antoine de Saint-Exupe ry took us aloft on his winged prose in the late 1930s and early 1940s....It is a splendid and many-faceted personal memoir that is not only one man's story but the story, in essence, of all men who fly. "New York Times Book Review"Few writers have ever drawn their readers so intimately into the shielded sanctum of the cockpit, and it is here that Mr. Gann is truly the artist. "Saturday Review"This fascinating, well-told autobiography is a complete refutation of the comfortable cliche that "man is master of his fate." As far as pilots are concerned, fate (or death) is a hunter who is constantly in pursuit of them....There is nothing depressing about "Fate Is the Hunter." There is tension and suspense in it but there is great humor too. Happily, Gann never gets too technical for the layman to understand. "The New Yorker"This book is an episodic log of some of the more memorable of [the author's] nearly ten thousand hours aloft in peace and (as a member of the Air Transport Command) in war. It is also an attempt to define by example his belief in the phenomenon of luck -- that "the pattern of anyone fate is only partly contrived by the individual." Cornelius Ryanauthor of "A Bridge Too Far" and "The Longest Day Fate Is the Hunter" is partly autobiographical, partly a chronicle of some of the most memorable and courageous pilots the reader will ever encounter in print; and always this book is about the workings of fate....The book is studded with characters equally as memorable as the dramas they act out. V.S. Pritchett"New Statesman" Mr. Gann is a writer saturated in his subject; he has the skill to make every instant sharp and important and we catch the fever to know that documentary writing does not often invite.