Robert Sabbag

“To most readers, Sabbag is known primarily as the author of Snowblind (1976), a book about a cocaine smuggler that catapulted its author into the public eye. In June 1979, at the peak of his celebrity, Sabbag boarded a twin-engine plane for a flight from New York to Cape Cod. The plane crashed, killing its pilot. Eight passengers survived. Now, 30 years later, Sabbag writes about the event in what might be his most emotionally resonant book. There are a lot of books about plane crashes, but not many of them are written by someone who was on board; this point of view offers readers an opportunity to learn, firsthand, what it’s like to go through a massively life-altering experience. Sabbag writes movingly, with painful honesty, about the terror of the crash and the daunting task of putting one’s life back together. He writes about his fellow survivors not as clichéd movie-of-the-week heroes but as real men and women who drew on hidden reserves of strength, risking their own lives to make sure everybody got out safely. A remarkably powerful, human story not merely of a plane crash but of the impact that one brief moment can have on an entire life.”

"A compelling mix of reporting and memoir... [it] packs an emotional wallop."