Here are 38 books that The Learjet Diaries fans have personally recommended if you like
The Learjet Diaries.
Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.
Shepherd is reader supported. When you buy books, we may earn an affiliate commission.
I have been involved in aviation all my adult life as a pilot and a flight instructor. I am also an avid reader, and I like to read books written by my fellow aviators. I find books written by pilots exciting because of the similar experiences we all share in the industry. All the books that I recommend are very accessible for any reader without previous aviation knowledge; in fact, I think you will find these books even more fascinating as they will open your eyes to the wonderful world of aviation!
Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger is one of the most well-known aviators in recent history. He was made famous by an extremely dangerous situation that he handled exceptionally well. This book is not just about the “Miracle on Hudson” incident; this is a biography about Captain Sully, how he became a pilot, and how decades of flying prepared him for this one single moment. It’s an inspirational book for anyone to read.
On January 15, 2009, the world witnessed one of the most remarkable emergency landings in aviation history when Captain Chesley Sully Sullenberger skillfully glided US Airways Flight 1549 onto the surface of the Hudson River, saving the lives of all 155 aboard. His cool actions not only averted tragedy but made him a hero and an inspiration worldwide. To Sullenberger, a calm, steady pilot with forty years of flying experience who is also a safety consulting expert, the landing was not a miracle but rather the result of years of practice and training-wisdom he gained in the cockpit of U.S.…
I have been involved in aviation all my adult life as a pilot and a flight instructor. I am also an avid reader, and I like to read books written by my fellow aviators. I find books written by pilots exciting because of the similar experiences we all share in the industry. All the books that I recommend are very accessible for any reader without previous aviation knowledge; in fact, I think you will find these books even more fascinating as they will open your eyes to the wonderful world of aviation!
CFI is short for a Certified Flight Instructor. As a former flight instructor and a chief flight instructor of a major flight school, I found this book very comical to read; just be aware, it’s a comedy and not to be taken seriously! This book is written by a former flight instructor who shares his stories that many flight instructors can relate to; being underpaid, flying with challenging students, and dealing with bad weather. While it is loosely based on actual events, read it for entertainment, not for factual information about flight training!
An underpaid, overworked Certified Flight Instructor cheats death while attempting to teach a cast of incompetent student pilots to fly at a skeezy South Florida flight school; all in the quest to build flight time so he can get a “real job” at an airline. The planes break, the regs break, metal gets bent, students are lost at sea, and a Top Gun wannabe student, who has four hundred hours of flight instruction, still hasn’t made his first solo flight. “CFI! The Book” is an over-the-top satirical aviation comedy that’s loosely based on real world experiences of flight instruction, but…
I have been involved in aviation all my adult life as a pilot and a flight instructor. I am also an avid reader, and I like to read books written by my fellow aviators. I find books written by pilots exciting because of the similar experiences we all share in the industry. All the books that I recommend are very accessible for any reader without previous aviation knowledge; in fact, I think you will find these books even more fascinating as they will open your eyes to the wonderful world of aviation!
Most people associate pilot jobs with working for airlines and wearing a uniform. Many people think about flying as similar to driving busses while, in fact, it’s far from it. Working as a ferry pilot can be one of the most exciting jobs on the planet! Ferry pilots get to fly countless different types of airplanes worldwide and face adventures like no one else. This book may not introduce you to the best decision-making by pilots, but it indeed introduces you to a different type of flying.
What could possibly go wrong? A LOT, if you spend 30 years flying small airplanes over the North Atlantic!
Join Kerry McCauley in the cockpit as he battles a fuel system malfunction over the Atlantic, a total electrical failure at night over the Sahara, being struck by lightning off the coast of Portugal and losing his engine in a thunderstorm. As an international ferry pilot Kerry’s almost insatiable, reckless quest for danger and adventure also led Kerry to put international smuggler and bank robber on his resume. Kerry’s skill, ingenuity and a heavy dose of luck were what allowed him…
I have been involved in aviation all my adult life as a pilot and a flight instructor. I am also an avid reader, and I like to read books written by my fellow aviators. I find books written by pilots exciting because of the similar experiences we all share in the industry. All the books that I recommend are very accessible for any reader without previous aviation knowledge; in fact, I think you will find these books even more fascinating as they will open your eyes to the wonderful world of aviation!
I have been to Alaska many times as Anchorage is one of the main fuel stops flying from Asia to the United States. It’s always fascinating to see so many small airplanes filling the skies there. It’s also fascinating to see so many planes on floats; those are the planes that can land in the lakes and rivers in remote areas. So I found this collection of stories an exciting introduction to bush flying in the Alaskan wilderness.
Flying in the Alaskan wilderness is an entirely different skill set than the way most pilots are trained; flying to and from remote gravel bars on wheels, streams and lakes on floats, and ski operations in deep snow and horrific weather. Many times I thought I would not make it, flying overloaded airplanes with the doors removed, external loads strapped to the floats, no navigational aids and totally alone in a vast wilderness with only my skills and determination to get me home.
After logging 4,000 flight hours, and flying sometimes 16 hours a day, I actually became as one…
I worked at the International Center for Transitional Justice in 2009 when Uruguay held a second referendum to overturn the country’s amnesty law that protected the police and military from prosecution for human rights abuses during the country’s dictatorship. Despite the country’s stable democracy and progressive politics in the 21st century, citizens quite surprisingly rejected the opportunity to overturn the state-sanctioned impunity law. My interest in broader accountability efforts in the world and that seemingly shocking vote in Uruguay drove me to want to study the roots of that failed effort, ultimately compelling a broader investigation into how human rights culture in Uruguay evolved, particularly during and after its period of military rule.
Operation Condor is the coordination that occurred between military governments across borders in South America during the Cold War to repress those suspected of being subversives. Some fled their home countries, only to be apprehended, tortured, and sometimes killed by a neighboring regime.
As difficult as it has been to try those involved in national crimes, it has been even more challenging to do so in these legally complex cases that span numerous jurisdictions. Lessa, however, has been following these accountability efforts for over a decade, and writes a fantastic book about these battles, shedding light on not only the events that occurred but also the struggle to document them and have accountability for victims.
Stories of transnational terror and justice illuminate the past and present of South America's struggles for human rights
Through the voices of survivors and witnesses, human rights activists, judicial actors, journalists, and historians, Francesca Lessa unravels the secrets of transnational repression masterminded by South American dictators between 1969 and 1981. Under Operation Condor, their violent and oppressive regimes kidnapped, tortured, and murdered hundreds of exiles, or forcibly returned them to the countries from which they had fled. South America became a zone of terror for those who were targeted, and of impunity for those who perpetuated the violence.
I have studied the intersection of human and natural history as an enthusiast, newspaper columnist, teacher, museum curator, and author. I strongly believe in the value of local knowledge, which has led me to work with and learn from several Plateau tribal communities. I use primary documents, including field journals, maps, artwork, oral histories, and the landscape itself as my building blocks. If I can arrive at a confluence of rivers on the same day of the year as some early white visitors and search for the living things that they wrote about during their stay, then I have something that I can compare directly with tribal oral histories.
I love comics of all kinds, so found it impossible to resist Andrea Wulf’s idea of adapting her popular biography of ecological pioneer Von Humboldt to the graphic form. Illustrator Lillian Melcher combines her comic chops and inventive design sense with Von Humboldt’s own drawings, maps, and specimen papers to create a book that truly enhances Wulf’s scholarly investigations. Plus it’s so much fun.
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Invention of Nature, comes a breathtakingly illustrated and brilliantly evocative recounting of Alexander Von Humboldt's five year expedition in South America.
Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) was an intrepid explorer and the most famous scientist of his age. His restless life was packed with adventure and discovery, but his most revolutionary idea was a radical vision of nature as a complex and interconnected global force that does not exist for the use of humankind alone. His theories and ideas were profoundly influenced by a…
I’m a writer, living in southwest France since 1995, and previously in Kenya for 20 years. Travel has always been my passion. I’ve written about hiking across France in Best Foot Forward, touring the perimeter by camping car in Travels with Tinkerbelle, cycling through the Marne Valley in The Valley of Heaven and Hell, and a Kenyan safari in Safari Ants, Baggy Pants and Elephants. Recently, due to COVID and with an elderly dog that suffers from separation anxiety, I couldn't leave for any length of time; I satisfy my wanderlust by reading other people’s adventures. My taste is for tales that include plenty of humour, and I’ve selected five which I have particularly enjoyed.
A vivid, amusing account of the author and her friend cycling and sleeping in the wild from Bolivia to Argentina. It is a story of determination and endurance as they push themselves to the extreme, always taking the hardest, highest route. Exhaustion, frustration, and sickness put their friendship to the test.
As somebody who is the polar opposite, always seeking the easiest way, I was fascinated by this couple’s approach to adventure, and awed by their achievements.
**WINNER of the 2020 Amazon Kindle Storyteller Literary Award**
"Llama Drama is simply hilarious. If anyone wants something witty and moving at the same time. Also, something empowering, then this is the one for them. I literally inhaled it." - Claudia Winkleman, TV Presenter and Author
What Amazon readers are saying about Llama Drama:
★★★★★ “Loved every minute of it!”
★★★★★ “An antidote for the madness of 2020”
★★★★★ “Truly inspiring”
★★★★★ “A brilliant book for anyone interested in travel, conquering their fears, cycling, adventure, South America”
As an Indigenous person, I have a lived experience of the negative impacts of an erased history on all people. Students I teach are shocked to hear that Indigenous people have been in the Americas for over 60,000 years. The violence against archaeologists publishing on older than Clovis sites in the Americas is intense; that got me asking why? I sought the truth about the evidence for Pleistocene age archaeology sites in the Americas. Global human migrations attest to the fact that humans have been migrating great distances for over 2 million years. Reclaiming and rewriting Indigenous history is one path of many, leading to healing and reconciliation.
Many archaeological site reports from South America are published in non -English languages and are often hard to locate. Where the South Wind Blows is an English language collected edition with chapters authored by South American archaeologists. Chapters included numerous discussions of archaeological sites throughout South America that pre-date Clovis sites.
The early prehistory of South America is poorly known by the English speaking world. This edited volume, translated from Spanish, contains twenty-one short papers documenting some of the most important recently investigated early archaeological sites from South America. These papers report Paleoamerican complexes and excavations of sites older than eleven thousand radiocarbon years before present, as well as cover issues in geoarchaeology, geochronology, Pleistocene extinction, and paleoecology. Numerous graphics are used to Illustrate site locations, excavations, and artifacts.
Hello! My name is Flavia Z. Drago and I'm a Mexican picturebook maker currently living with my partner and my cat in the UK. As a child, most of the books that I read came from foreign countries, particularly Europe and the US, and these have had a huge influence on my work as an author and illustrator. However, now that I'm in charge of making the books that I would have liked as a child, I enjoy adding details of my Mexican culture whenever possible. To some extent, the books that I've shared with you collect some of the stories, experiences, and emotions that as a Mexican have impacted my life.
I would have loved to have had this book in my childhood! As a child, I grew up reading myths and folk tales that came mostly from Europe, however, this book gives a glimpse of myths in America long before the colonization. Thanks to this book I discovered many myths from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego—or the Sea-Ringed World, as the Aztecs called it—which sparked my curiosity in order to know more. Also, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that some of the stories were intertwined.
Even if this is not a picture book, I decided to include it because the stylish and sophisticated illustrations (of the multi-awarded) Mexican illustrator Amanda Mijangos, fill the spaces that the text is missing and add another level of reading to each one of the tales.
Fifteen thousand years before Europeans stepped foot in the Americas,
people had already spread from tip to tip and coast to coast. Like all
humans, these Native Americans sought to understand their place in the
universe, the nature of their relationship with the divine, and the
origin of the world into which their ancestors had emerged.
The answers lay in their sacred stories.
Author Maria Garcia Esperon, illustrator Amanda Mijangos, and
translator David Bowles have gifted us a treasure. Their talents have
woven this collection of stories from nations and cultures across our
two continents-the Sea-Ringed World, as the Aztecs…
I am an award-winning, national best-selling author who loves reading as much as I love writing. Combine that with a good, smooth bourbon and it’s a win-win. Like my literary journey, my love for bourbon has been filled with surprises and challenges. Romance writing found me. I didn’t go looking for it. The journey introduced me to great writers and amazing stories and taught me to write better. Distilleries could extol the health benefits of bourbon, but I discovered it can be subtle, soul-searing, and pairs beautifully with a good meal and an even better book. Like my writing, bourbon leaves you feeling like you’ve had a great meal and threw in dessert!
Discovering my affinity for Historical Fiction, and then discovering the writings of Vanessa Riley was a dream come true.
Island Queen hit all the right buttons for my writing spirit. It was lyrical, poetic, engaging, and one of the most beautifully written books in my personal library. It was storytelling at its very best and I’d recommend this book for that reason alone. But it also has great personal significance for me.
My 85-year-old mother who only learned to read late in life was an avid reader. These past few years her reading has slowed, the process becoming difficult for her to do. I recommended audiobooks for her, and Island Queen was her first. Watching her become completely lost in the story, tears sometimes streaming down her face, or the lilt of a giggle rolling off her lips was everything.
This is a story that tugs at your heartstrings and…
"Riveting and transformative, evocative and immersive...by turns vibrant and bold and wise, discovering Dorothy's story is a singular pleasure."--The New York Times
A remarkable, sweeping historical novel based on the incredible true life story of Dorothy Kirwan Thomas, a free Black woman who rose from slavery to become one of the wealthiest and most powerful landowners in the colonial West Indies.
Born into slavery on the tiny Caribbean island of Montserrat, Doll bought her freedom-and that of her sister and her mother-from her Irish planter father and built a legacy of wealth and power as an entrepreneur, merchant, hotelier, and…
Interested in
South America,
Colombia,
and
Argentina?
11,000+ authors have recommended their favorite books and what they love about them.
Browse their picks for the best books about
South America,
Colombia,
and
Argentina.
