Above and Beyond: John F. Kennedy and America's Most Dangerous Cold War Spy Mission

From the authors of the bestselling The Finest Hours comes the riveting, deeply human story of President John F. Kennedy and two U-2 pilots, Rudy Anderson and Chuck Maultsby, who risked their lives to save America during the Cuban Missile Crisis

During the ominous two weeks of the Cold War's terrifying peak, two things saved humanity: the strategic wisdom of John F. Kennedy and the U-2 aerial spy program.

On October 27, 1962, Kennedy, strained from back pain, sleeplessness, and days of impossible tension, was briefed about a missing spy plane. Its pilot, Chuck Maultsby, was on a surveillance mission over the North Pole, but had become disoriented and steered his plane into Soviet airspace. If detected, its presence there could be considered an act of war.

As the president and his advisers wrestled with this information, more bad news came: another U-2 had gone missing, this one belonging to Rudy Anderson. His mission: to photograph missile sites over Cuba. For the president, any wrong move could turn the Cold War nuclear.

Above and Beyond is the intimate, gripping account of the lives of these three war heroes, brought together on a day that changed history.

Selected as a "Top 10 Nonfiction Books to Read" (2018) by the MA Book Awards

Author: Casey Sherman, Michael J. Tougias
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Published: 04/17/2018
Pages: 360
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.20lbs
Size: 9.40h x 6.30w x 1.30d
ISBN13: 9781610398046
ISBN10: 1610398041
BISAC Categories:
- History | United States | 20th Century
- Political Science | Intelligence & Espionage
- History | Military | Aviation & Space

About the Author
Casey Sherman is an acclaimed journalist and author of ten books, including The Finest Hours, a New York Times bestseller that became a major motion picture, and CBS Films' Patriots Day.

A graduate of Boston University, he is also a contributing writer for Esquire and Boston Magazine, an international correspondent for FOX News, the co-founder of Whydah Productions, and a much sought after national speaker. He lives in Massachusetts.

Michael J. Tougias is the author and coauthor of twenty-nine books, including So Close to Home (Pegasus, 2016), Rescue of the Bounty (Scribner, 2014), A Storm too Soon (Scribner, 2013), The Finest Hours (Scribner, 2010), Fatal Forecast (Scribner, 2007), and Ten Hours Until Dawn (St Martin's Press, 2005). Tougias has written for the New York Times and several other prestigious magazines and newspapers, and has lectured across the country to groups as diverse as Fortune 500 Corporations, Associations and Public Libraries. He lives in Massachusetts and Florida.