Fate Is the Hunter - by Ernest K Gann (Paperback)

About the Book

"This book is an episodic log of some of the more memorable of (the author's) nearly 10,000 hours aloft in peace and in war. It is also an attempt to define by example his belief in the phenomenon of luck-- that the pattern of anyone's fate is only partly contrived by the individual".--The New Yorker.

Book Synopsis

Ernest K. Gann's classic pilot's memoir is an up-close and thrilling account of the treacherous early days of commercial aviation. "Few writers have ever drawn readers so intimately into the shielded sanctum of the cockpit, and it is hear that Mr. Gann is truly the artist" (The New York Times Book Review).

"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" (Chicago Tribune). In his inimitable style, Gann brings you right into the cockpit, recounting both the triumphs and terrors of pilots who flew when flying was anything but routine.

Review Quotes

"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."--Cornelius Ryan, author of A Bridge Too Far and The Longest Day

"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."--New York Times Book Review

"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."--V.S. Pritchett "New Statesman"

"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.'"--The New Yorker

"This fascinating, well-told autobiography is a complete refutation of the comfortable cliché 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."--Saturday Review

"This purely wonderful autobiographical volume is the best thing on flying and the meaning of flying that we have had since Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 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."--Chicago Sunday Tribune

About the Author

Ernest K. Gann is the author of numerous books, among them The High and the Mighty, Twilight for the Gods, The Aviator, and The Magistrate. He lives in Anacortes, Washington, and continues to write and publish prolifically.