JFK, Jr., and Me
The Other Side of Camelot
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
Crossing the sound, the haze blinded John like two hands over his face. Gone were the familiar lights of Connecticut and Long Island. The flier had no reference points and couldn't see where he was going. But his compass pointed east and he soldiered on. Back in my bunk, the questions closed in. Was he warned about the haze? Why didn’t he turn on his transponder so air traffic control could follow him? Or did he feel invincible and like everything else, could easily handle anything his cruel, glorious life threw his way? In the inky cockpit, Carolyn knew something was wrong. The engine wailed and the tilt of the plane seemed unnatural, even though their minds told them they were going straight. John John was agitated, his head darted about and his hands, stark white, strangled the yoke. The altimeter plummeted: 500, 250. “We’re going to die,” a voice sobbed, though John didn’t know whose. “Shut up, shut up!” John was in a death spiral. Unable—or unwilling—to believe the instruments and relying on instinct which, in his tragic case, was failing him. His wings were tilted and he was pulling back on the yoke, hastening his path to the sea.
Formats
Book Details
About the Book
Get in the cockpit the fateful night John F. Kennedy, Jr. crashed his plane off Martha’s Vineyard, and take a journey through celebrity, tragedy, murder, and the lives of people on the other side of Camelot. Author Robert Chartuk was there when John John’s plane was lifted out of the Atlantic and had a wheelhouse view of the TWA Flight 800 disaster as it unfolded near his hometown on Eastern Long Island. Take a front-row seat for this heartbreaking and humorous account of his small-town life in the shadow of the Kennedys, including the infamous murder of New York financier Ted Ammon—stories that tell of the profound consequences of the choices people make. From “Deadman’s Curve” and “The Mother of All Snowstorms” to the joys of flight and the characters that make up our rich political history—and the accusation that the author himself helped bring about Kennedy’s death—these are stories that just had to be put down on paper.
About the Author
Robert Chartuk was a newspaper reporter in the Hamptons before embarking on a turbulent career in government and politics. His job with NOAA put him in the middle of some of history’s most heartbreaking tragedies: The Flight 800 disaster and the crash of John F. Kennedy, Jr. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Writing Arts from New York’s Oswego College and still lives in his hometown of Center Moriches.