In a questionable move, while flying last week I decided to read a book about a plane crash. This did not freak me out at all, since I am a big believer in the This Couldn’t Happen To Me theory. But I was certainly impressed by the true story of survival as told in Crazy For the Storm by Norman Ollestad. Actually the part that I liked the most wasn’t the tale of survival, but actually the stories and descriptions about the author’s dad, who was an amazing man and didn’t survive the plane crash.
(Nerdy but fun book fact: this guy’s dad was also named Norman Ollestad, and played one of the kids in the original Cheaper By the Dozen movie. I really loved that book as a kid. I don’t know why Steve Martin agreed to butcher it in a remake. He should have rejected the script outright when he realized he would be acting alongside Miss Hillary Duff.)
I think that when you survive a plane crash, it’s probably easy to just mail it in on the book you write about it, but Ollestad didn’t do that. The character study of his dad (since that is basically what it was) was really fascinating – a story that demanded writing. And it didn’t hurt that both the author and his father share the first name of World’s Best Dog Norman.
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| Gratuitous Dog Photo |
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