CONQUERORS OF THE SKY
A century of aviation and world history are revisited in novelist and historian Fleming's latest offering, which tracks the development of the airplane from a fantastic toy into a potent economic and military force. In the early 1930s, Frank Buchanan is a brilliant and conscientious aircraft designer, and Adrian Van Ness is his unscrupulous business partner in the increasingly powerful airplane industry of California. Associates, wives, mistresses, sex clubs and gallons of booze accompany them through peace and war as their initial idealism fades into cynicism. Real-life personalities make appearances: Charles Lindbergh survives airmail night duty and famously flies solo to Paris; JFK is regularly treated to the services of a high-class whore; and a giggling Richard Nixon is shown a porn flick before getting a promo film pitch for a new aircraft. The book is at its best in its aerial set-pieces.