Who’s Ideal Was This

The Making of “On Wings of Luck”

Thirty-five years in the cockpit doesn't fit neatly into one book. I tried. When I started writing Better Lucky Than Good, I quickly realized it would end up looking like War and Peace — and take just as long to read. I hadn't planned on four books, but here we are.

I'll let you in on a secret: after some of the hair-raising tales in the first two books — three, if you include Hangmen — I worried that On Wings of Luck would be boring. The bigger the airplanes you fly and the bigger the company you work for, the safer flying gets. It has to be. How do you make stories interesting when you're talking about safety instead of risk?

Some pilots think airline flying is boring. They dismissively call it being a bus driver — perhaps that's the ones who couldn't make the grade. Bus drivers do an important job; they have people's lives in their hands too. But they don't have to fly among thunderstorms or land in fog.

I never felt that way. It was always a challenge to get everything right. Little mistakes that no one else noticed would still earn myself the comment: "There goes my perfect flight."

It took me longer than normal to write On Wings of Luck because of some health issues, and it came out almost two years after The Lucky One. Thank you to all the readers who have stuck with me.

I plodded ahead, trying to make everyday life in an airline cockpit exciting — or at least interesting. Most often it was the training where the real tension and sweaty armpits came from. Wait until you read the chapter from my upcoming book, The Flight from Hell.

Transportation has been dangerous since man first tried to ride a horse. Then came wagons, boats, cars, trucks, and buses. When we conquered the skies, it got even more dangerous. Other than warfare and disease, transportation has been one of history's biggest killers.

It's important to me that readers and passengers understand how much training airline pilots go through. As airplanes become more advanced, it's not just about flying anymore — it's about learning complex systems and programming computers. But just because computers do so much doesn't mean you can sit back and relax. Computers fail. They must be watched at all times. It's more tiring than it looks, and sometimes it's just easier to do it yourself.

Thanks to advances in aircraft design and simulator training, airline flying has become the safest mode of transportation in the history of the world.

I tried to portray not only what it was like to be an airline pilot during that era, but also what it was like for an oddball like me to make it that far and succeed — even when it was a struggle.

It's been almost four months since release, and I'm surprised and happy to say On Wings of Luck is outselling all my other books, including Hangmen. I'm not sure why — perhaps not everyone wants to read about trying to get yourself killed. Even I have to admit there's nothing wrong with that.

I'd like to thank A.G. Billig Billig of Self-Publishing Mastery for helping me with the title and cover design. It's a relief not trying to do everything myself, the way I did when I first started this writing journey

Most of all, I want to thank you — the reader. You kept me writing through the hard stretches. Every pilot needs a reason to get back in the cockpit. You're mine.

Some people have a corner office. I had this.