Customer Reviews

President's Plane Is Missing

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I read this book when it first came out over twenty years ago and very much enjoyed it. A best seller in its time, I recently came across it on my bookshelf and, remembering how much I had enjoyed it, decided to give it another go-around. Time has not diminished the author's ability to grip the reader with this political thriller, though some of it now seems a little anachronistic. Women are regarded differently now and the cold war has long been an issue of the past. Of course, the world has changed much since this book was first released.

The book basically opens on a world that teeters on the edge of global disaster, as an uneasy cold war peace is threatened by the specter of a nuclear war. A harried president, worn and weary by the fray, suddenly announces that he wishes to take some time off and schedules a trip on Air Force One to an undisclosed location. The plane takes off as scheduled but never reaches its destination. When the plane is discovered, the mystery only deepens, leaving a weak vice-president to struggle with the pieces of an ever deepening mystery, as well as with a world seemingly on the brink of war.

This is a tightly woven tale that those who like a good political thriller will enjoy.

Written in the politically claustrophobic 1960's, Robert J. Serling's, "The President's Plane is Missing", was a huge hit. In the novel, the country is faced with the possibility of a nuclear confrontation with Communist China. Russia refuses to play their hand, but the reader knows who they side with. Popular President Jeremy Haines, (a combination of Kennedy and LBJ according to Serling) is concerned that any wrong diplomatic move by the US could result in disaster. Badly in need of a vacation, Haines and his staff leave for a Palm Springs retreat. On route, Air Force One encounters atmospheric turbulance and disappears off the radar screen.

Is the President dead? What will happen to the country under the direction of an incompetent Acting President? Will the Chinese see this as an opportunity to attack? All those questions, and more, will be answered in this novel.

If you are looking for a fast-reading political thriller, (and can deal with a little outdatedness) then "The President's Plane is Missing" is a book you will want to pick up.

RECOMMENDED

This was the first real suspense, adventure genre book that I read. It kept me spellbound.. so much so that I read it on the subway platforms, while waiting for the next train. I haven't seen a copy for twenty years, so whether it would hold up over time is the question.

. . .of the political novel, then you probably ought to invest some time into this fairly well-done example.

While the book only deserves three stars (minus one for quality and minus another for its datedness) it does explore moral questions involved during the Cold War; thougt-provoking questions about the balance between national security and freedom of the press; and an interesting scenario involving the Constitutional ramifications of a President "missing and presumed dead" where the details remain unclear at best.

Three stars.

I read this book for a book report. I found this book very well written. It captured my attention from the title, especially after Sept. 11. I found that this book started out slow, but when it got interesting I couldn't put it down. I believe this book is suspense(not horror)with a little bit of mystery. If you like books like that, you will love this book. Pick it up and enjoy!

I bought this book on vacation many years ago. I spent most of my vacation reading 0 I could not put it down - and now, many years later, it still has that fascination for me. Highly recommended - if you can find a copy!

Send it on the "A" wire: This is a great period piece that probably had people talking in the late 1960s the way the movie "Crimson Tide" had people talking in the mid 1990s.

What happens when the Chinese are threatening to launch nuclear missiles, the President goes missing, the President's brother (who, at least from a distance, looks an awful lot like the President) goes missing as well, the little-liked Vice President, who wasn't briefed on the Chinese situation before the President's disappearance, has to take on the role of "Acting" President until it can be determined if the President is dead or alive, Cabinet members who know more than others have to walk a thin line between keeping the missing President's confidences and letting the Vice President and remaining cabinet members know what was supposed to happen if the President's plane hadn't gone missing, and the press begins to unravel a story they may not wish to reveal?

The book is WAY too slow at the beginning, but when Air Force One takes off, the story does too.

I read this book in 1969 while I was in the hospital after the birth of my son. Back then, woman were kept in the hospital longer than today. I hadn't picked out a name for my son yet and loved the name "Jeremy" that was given to the president in the book. It was a very gripping story and now I, jokingly, tell my son he was named after a president!

Full disclosure: I am a professional editor, so it's almost impossible for me to read a book -- any book -- without mentally editing it.

The story line itself is compelling: the US is left without a president, and, with China threatening imminent attack, the vice president just hasn't got the wherewithal to lead the country. On the surface, it was a good read.

But I have problems with it.

On the very first page of the first chapter, Serling writes of the president of the US: "Since his wife's death, five years before when he was governor of a Midwestern state, he had acquired the habit of eating breakfast in his bedroom on the second floor of the White House..."

Wait a minute! He ate breakfast in his bedroom in the White House before he became president?? How did he do that?

Those who have read the book will know that there was a hideous plane crash, in which all the passengers were severely burned, most beyond recognition. One character on the scene says, "Individual facial characteristics have been completely obliterated by fire." The voice and flight recorders were burned so badly there was little hope of retrieving any usable data from them. Those on the scene described what was left of the bodies: "Merely stumps of blackened flesh, looking for all the world like abnormally large, overcooked roasts."

Yet the "experts" on the crash site used fingerprinting to identify the bodies. How did they do that?

It's probably not fair to criticize those who aren't around to defend themselves, but Mr. Serling should have consulted an editor. The book was, according to the cover of the version I read, on the NY Times bestseller list for 30 weeks. Didn't anybody notice these glaring errors? I won't even list the unfortunate grammatical constructions -- or lack thereof. And there were a lot of them.

Recommended as a fair read, but with major caveats.

This is an entertaining read all the way through, although admittedly the language and social views are a bit dated. Unique perspective from the wire services angle, and as a former journalist myself, it's interesting to get a look of how my contemporaries operated even 20 or 30 years ago. I highly recommend this book, and though it's not as good as the original, the sequel is equally entertaining.