Altitude Zero [Paperback]

Hank Searls (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1993

When Anne Woodhouse's violent ex-husband, Cal McCann, escapes from a mental asylum, boards Flight 408, and takes control of the plane, Anne, the plane's co-pilot, must try to stop him. Reprint. NYT. AB.

Editorial Reviews

From Kirkus Reviews

Poor copilot Anne Woodhouse. The company she flies for, PacLant Airlines, is trying to protect its lawsuit against Boeing by pressing her to change her memory about a fatal accident she saw the previous Christmas Eve--and her fellow employees, who hate her for scabbing a few years ago, aren't giving her an inch, even though they all know PacLant's safety procedures are dangerously lax. Oh, and her ex- husband's trying to kill her. Anne's ex--charming, violent Vietnam vet Cal McCann--is actually behind all her problems: he forced her into scabbing by ducking out on child-support payments, and he ruined her also with her scabrous boss Stanley Block, Jr., when he broke into his ritzy compound after the divorce to kill the company mascot. And it doesn't take long to realize that he's behind that Christmas Eve accident, too--an earlier attempt to kill Anne. It doesn't take you long, that is; the people charged with finding this stuff out--Cal's dewy-eyed shrink Gail Flodden and obsessive NTSC investigator Mike Ruble--misread the signals for just long enough for Cal to escape from his VA hospital, talk his way into the cabin of the flight taking Anne and her daughter out of the country, and set the plane on course to crash into the Block estate. Flodden and Ruble die, of course (as do most of the cast) but not Anne. Action veteran Searle (Kataki, etc.) spins a pleasurably implausible yarn that would probably make a terrific movie if it didn't come out of Airplane and its ilk in the first place. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Fasten your seat belts for this one...A white knuckle flight you don't want to miss." -- Booklist --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 291 pages
• Publisher: Jove Books (December 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0515112704
• ISBN-13: 978-0515112702
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,601,388 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Top of the genre, January 24, 2011

By 

P. Wentz "Jackball" (Florida, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Altitude Zero (Paperback)

I'm a big fan of airline-thriller novels, yet readily admit many of these books feature stereotypical characters. Not so with Altitude Zero. This work can boast of having one of the most disturbing villains I've come across in a long time, as well as a female pilot!

5.0 out of 5 stars Excitement and Suspense in the Wild Blue Yonder, January 14, 2001

By 

"axgreen" (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Altitude Zero (Paperback)

A single-mother copilot on an airline torn by labor strife, with a psychotic ex-husband who wants to kill her and kidnap their daughter, endures discrimination as she fights to make captain. Utterly enthralling. My wife and I follow Hank Searls' books (JAWS 2, KATAKI, BLOOD SONG, OVERBOARD) and search for their arrival like passengers watching the arrival board in an airport.