Flying: The Aviation Trilogy

I am a pilot who up until this year hadn't flown in over twenty years. Reading this book opened my eyes again to my love of flying and the spiritual freedom I have enjoyed by my time in the air. Because of this book I have once again started flying. But the book is more than just flying. It is about finding out what is important to you -REALLY important and finding the courage to look beyond all of the excuses for not following your dream. Trust the universe and do what you were meant to do!!

I bought this book as a gift for my son who is taking flying lessons and working at a small airport. I had read Bach's stories separately and liked them all. My son loved it! It makes a lovely gift.

This work is an "omnibus" edition of Richard Bach's three great classics on flying. Readers familiar with Bach tend to think of "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" (any of us in college in the 70s remember that one!) but long before Jonathan took wing, Bach had his own flying adventures, first as a military pilot during the early years of the cold war, and then, remarkably as a "barnstormer" flying an antique plane around the country. These three books recount those adventures of his earlier years. I first discovered them when learning to fly in my early twenties. Time, circumstances, life in general took me away from my passion of flying until recently, when I again took to the air in a light weight aircraft and am just about finished with restoring a light weight replica of a P-51 Mustang. I fell back into Bach's works and discovered, yet again, all the wonderful memories, and yes, telling me as well about why, after a bit of a gut tightening moment when something doesn't feel right with the plane, I take a deep breath and behold, there is the splendor of the world below me at dawn, the beauty of circling a cloud that no one, before or ever after, will see as I now see it, and that sweet sense of being one with my plane as I slide into final approach and touch the earth again. If you love flying, this is your book. If you love someone who loves flying (and can't figure out exactly why they do such crazy things!) buy this book, read it, get the insights, then hand it over to the pilot who will be thrilled that you now "understand." I am delighted that Bach's three great works are back out there again in this single edition. Bill in North Carolina co-owner of a Loehle P-51 Mustang "Gloria Ann III"