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JOHN
J. NANCE
BOOK REVIEWS
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(Review
1 of 3)
Kirkus Reviews
February 1, 2001
HEADWIND
John J. Nance
Retired Air Force pilot Nance shows
the same skill at guiding a thriller through white-knuckle
weather as he did as a civilian landing a 737.
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The titles of Nance's fiction (BLACKOUT
(2000), etc.) are usually a declaration of the particular
hardship a pilot may face against overwhelming odds.
This time, the titular headwind doesn't show up until
the last 50 pages and isn't really meteorological
but instead the power of legal headwinds a lawyer
faces while guiding an airline pilot through his storm
of difficulties in landing anywhere in Europe. Most
nations have signed a world Treaty Against Torture,
but during US President (now ex-President) John Harris's
tenure, A CIA-sponsored group of mercenaries invaded
a drug base in Peru and tortured - then killed - drug
workers and their families. President Miraflores of
Peru has signed an Interpol Warrant for the arrest
of Harris when his commercial jet lands in Athens.
Piloting is Captain Craig Dayton, still a major in
the Air Force reserve. Dayton knows that if arrested
Harris will be held in a Greek jail, then bounced
to Lima for a show trial and execution (by burning,
as it happens). So, essentially, he hijacks his own
jet and its hundred-odd passengers and flies off to
Rome. But the Interpol warrant is in effect all over
Europe and there's no place Dayton can land without
surrendering his ex-Commander in Chief. Meanwhile,
by cell phone, Harris hires Jay Reinhart, a brilliant
international lawyer with a checkered past, to stay
the warrants and get him safely back to the States.
Reinhart fights against devilishly slick international
lawyer Stuart Campbell, who represents Peru and chases
after the fleeing jet as it approaches endless landing
fields where it can't land. The first big showdown
is in court, where swords will clash before an Irish
judge.
Hugely entertaining: a gripper that
not only battles heavy headwinds while fuel runs low
but plunges you headfirst into a meat-grinder of international
legal complexities.
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(Review
2 of 3)
Publishers Weekly
February 12, 2001
pwforecasts: A tinted review in adult Forecasts indicates
a book that we believe is of paramount interest to
our readers but that hasn't received a starred or
boxed review.
HEADWIND
John J. Nance
Putnam, $24.95, (400p) April 2001
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The real-life Pinochet extradition
case inspires this international legal thriller peppered
with best-selling author Nance's (BLACKOUT,
etc.) trademark razor-edge escape scenarios and death-defying
aviation theatrics. Peru charges that former U. S.
President John Harris ordered the brutal slaughter
of peasant families by Shining Path mercenaries on
a CIA-led raid on a Peruvian drug factory, in violation
of the recently ratified International Treaty Against
Torture. Powerful British lawyer Sir William Stuart
Campbell takes Peru's case and, with a personal grudge
to avenge, plans for the immediate arrest and extradition
of the former president, who is on board a German
commercial airline about to leave Athens. Tipped off
by an American stewardess, the American and British
pilots fake a hijacking and run for Rome, only to
learn that warrants are waiting at every European
airport. From the plane, Harris calls Jay Reinhart,
a brilliant former law partner who was booted off
the Texas bench, and gets him to take on Campbell's
formidable team. While Reinhart jousts with Campbell
in foreign courts, the pilots evade warrants by staying
airborne with one stop at an American military base
for refueling, playing nifty tricks that fool police,
air traffic towers and their own company executives.
Nance gets in jabs at diplomatic scuttling of military
actions and sets up the David vs. Goliath legal battle
with aplomb. Hair-raising near-disaster in the air,
high courtroom drama and a strong international cast
of characters make this surefire bestseller a nonstop
read, with gut-wrenching twists that leave the reader
scrabbling for a parachute.
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(Review
3 of 3)
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
HEADWIND
March 2000
Veteran aviation writer John
J. Nance, a commercial pilot and TV commentator
as well as a best-selling author, weighs in with a
timely thriller whose near misses in the sky can't
compete for drama with the political suspense unfolding
on the ground.
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Former U.S. president John Harris,
a principled politician who walked away from certain
reelection because of a campaign promise to serve
a single term, barely misses arrest on an Interpol
warrant accusing him of violating the Treaty Against
Torture by ordering a CIA operation against a biological
weapons laboratory in Peru that resulted in the mutilation
and murder of hundreds of innocent civilians.
The Peruvian government's hired gun
is a British barrister who's tangled with Harris before;
Harris's is an old friend and defrocked Texas judge
who's languishing in obscurity at a Wyoming college
when his former mentor calls on him for help--and
who, not so coincidentally, has a deep-seated fear
of flying. An added fillip is the plot's many references
to the ongoing extradition battle over former Chilean
President Augusto Pinochet on similar charges. But
the real hero of this fast-paced suspense story is
Craig Dayton, a reserve military officer and captain
of the Boeing 737 that's running out of fuel as it
searches for a safe harbor for Harris--not easy to
find, since every nation in Europe has signed the
treaty and will arrest Harris as soon as he lands.
It's a brilliant setup, and Nance
handles it more than competently. Unusual for this
writer, he pays as much attention to his human characters,
their motivations and complexities, as he does to
the aeronautical details. Harris is a bit overdone--what
president ever walked away from a sure reelection
win? And a secondary plot line featuring a group of
veterans on Harris's flight who come to the aid of
their former commander in chief errs on the side of
sentimentality. Even so, this is a first-class read
from a million-mile writer. --Jane Adams
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