Aviation History

The US Air Force is a powerful military force. But there is more to this high-flying military branch than you might imagine. These surprising facts about the US Air Force will amaze you.

“A GRIPPING CLASSIC. Exhaustively researched, The Hunter Killers puts you directly into a Wild Weasel fighter cockpit during the Vietnam War. Dan Hampton lets you feel it for yourself as no one else could.”--Colonel LEO THORSNESS, Wild Weasel pilot and Medal of Honor recipient At the height...

The pivotal true story of the first fifty-three days of the standoff between Imperial Japanese and a handful of Marine aviators defending the Americans dug in at Guadalcanal, from the New York Times bestselling author of Indestructible and Race of Aces. On August 20, 1942, twelve Marine...

The 'Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club' was the tongue-in-cheek nickname of the US Seventh Fleet that was stationed off the coast of Vietnam and this book tells the full story of the US Naval air campaign in the Vietnam War from 1965 to 1975.

A captivating and inspiring memoir by Canada's first man in space. On October 5th, 1984, Marc Garneau made history. Blasting off from the Kennedy Space Center aboard the U.S. Space Shuttle and reaching a speed of 28,000 km/hour, he became the first Canadian to fly to outer space. That monumental...

Listeners will learn over 100 facts about military sea and military air vehicles, such as helicopters, bombers, and stealth flighters, as well as submarines, mammoth ships, and militarized barges.

The P-38 Lightning was one of the fastest operational fighters of World War II, famous for its successes in North Africa and the Pacific. In The P-38 Lightning and the Men Who Flew It, Wolfgang W. E. Samuel shares the stories of the young men who climbed into the cockpits of the P-38 to fight for freedom, and of those who created, tested, and deployed these fearsome machines. The P-38 was the product of the Lockheed Corporation, the first fighter they ever built, principally conceptualized by Kelly Johnson, whose design was to meet Air Corps specifications. But it was no easy plane to fly.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER THE BASIS FOR THE MAJOR MOTION PICTURE A “riveting” (USA Today) true tale of courage during America’s “forgotten war” in Korea, from the author of A Higher Call and Spearhead “In the spirit of Unbroken and The Boys in the Boat comes Devotion...

From historian and bestselling author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Empire of the Summer Moon comes a “captivating, thoroughly researched” (The New York Times Book Review) tale of the rise and fall of the world’s largest airship—and the doomed love story between an ambitious British...

2020 Audie Awards WINNER - History/Biography As the fiftieth anniversary of the first lunar landing approaches, the award winning historian and perennial New York Times bestselling author takes a fresh look at the space program, President John F. Kennedy’s inspiring challenge, and...

Now a major motion picture from Clint Eastwood, starring Tom Hanks—the inspirational autobiography by one of the most captivating American heroes of our time, Capt. ‘Sully’ Sullenberger—the pilot who miraculously landed a crippled US Airways Flight 1549 in New York’s Hudson River...

“A fast-paced, well-researched…irresistible” (USA TODAY) World War II aviation account of friendship, heroism, and sacrifice that reads like Unbroken meets The Dirty Dozen from the authors of the #1 New York Times bestselling The Heart of Everything That Is. It’s 1942, just after the...

A gripping, major new history of the explosion of the “Titanic of the Skies,” the rise of Nazism and the beginning of World War II For thirty-seven seconds on May 6, 1937, the Hindenburg lit up the sky over Lakehurst, New Jersey in an indelible conflagration that shocked the world and...

The true story of World War 2’s legendary Hell’s Angels—the 8th Air Force’s 303rd Bomb Group. Although the United States declared war against Germany in December 1941, a successful assault on Nazi-occupied Europe could not happen until Germany’s industrial and military might were...

Bestselling author of The Arsenal of Democracy and The Accidental President, A. J. Baime returns with the incredible story of the airplane that ended World War II, the B-29 Superfortress, the rise of American airpower, and the man who made it all possible. Of all the feats of American ingenuity...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The true, unsolved story of D. B. Cooper’s 1971 airplane hijacking, one of the greatest cold cases of the twentieth century, by an author featured in D.B. Cooper: Where Are You?!, now streaming on Netflix “Here is writing and storytelling that is vivid and...

The riveting conclusion to Scott Westerfeld’s New York Times bestselling trilogy that’s “sure to become a classic” (School Library Journal). Alek and Deryn are on the last leg of their round-the-world quest to end World War I, reclaim Alek’s throne as prince of Austria, and finally...

Glamour, danger, liberation: in a Mad Men–era of commercial flight, Pan Am World Airways attracted the kind of young woman who wanted out, and wanted up Required to have a college education, speak two languages, and possess the political savvy of a Foreign Service officer, a jet-age stewardess...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER Alex Kershaw, New York Times bestselling author of Against All Odds, returns with an utterly immersive, adrenaline-driven account of D-Day combat. “Meet the assaulters: pathfinders plunging from the black, coxswains plowing the whitecaps, bareknuckle Rangers scaling...

Europe has fallen. Pearl Harbor is in flames. Enter: the Eighth. In 1941 the RAF fought a desperate battle of survival against the Luftwaffe over Britain. Then, from across the Atlantic, came a new generation of American pilots, gunners, and bombardiers, a new generation of flying machines...