China. 1944. A downed American pilot. Enemy territory. No map. No radio. Lost in the Himalayan Mountains in a snowstorm.
Second Lieutenant Bob Binzer didn't expect to survive the bailout. When his C-47 ran out of fuel over the Himalayas, he and his three-man crew - co-pilot, navigator, and radio operator - had two choices: jump or crash. They jumped - into a blizzard, onto impossible terrain, behind Japanese lines. Now Binzer's only mission is the one nobody assigned him: find his scattered crew, keep them alive, and get them all home.
Hump Pilots had a name for the route over the Himalayas - the Aluminum Trail, marked not by signs but by the wreckage of American aircraft that didn't make it. Bob Binzer and his crew were about to become part of that trail. What followed was a series of near-death experiences so harrowing that survival itself seemed impossible. And waiting at the end of it all - one open door, four men, and a parachute nobody should have trusted.
Told with remarkable humility and an aviator's eye for detail, The Able Queen won an International Impact Award*. It gives readers a thrilling, approachable slice of forgotten history - the kind of true story so improbable you'd swear it was fiction. A book readers finish, then immediately start reading again.*
Readers who love these will love The Able Queen:
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- China Burma India Theater
- True Survival Story
- Hump Pilots
- Against All Odds
- Forgotten WWII History
- Military Aviation
- Band of Brothers
- Man vs Nature
- American Military Hero
Format: Memoir / Narrative Nonfiction · POV: First person (Bob Binzer) · Content Notes: Wartime survival, military combat, aviation history; no graphic content · Series: Standalone
