Bookshelf

In the words of Captain Kirk

Boldly Go

William Shatner, the actor best known for his role as Capt. James T. Kirk of the spaceship Enterprise in Star Trek, and recent passenger on Blue Origin into space, offers up his insight into living 91 years on Earth in Boldly Go. The book is like having a conversation with Shatner—he jumps from subject to even more intriguing subjects, reveals embarrassing situations in his life, offers insights into what he sees for the future, and tells many exploits and adventures in his life. For example, he admits he was peeved that he was not chosen for the first flight of Blue Origin and so at first turned down the offer to ride on the second flight; that he writes music and has written many songs and produced an album (as did friend and actor Leonard Nimoy, “Spock”); and that he once was speaking to an audience and had to leave the stage because he’d had a unexpected bowel movement—but he cleaned up and continued the show. Shatner boldly goes to a lot of places in his new book, cowritten with Joshua Brandon. —Julie Summers Walker

Reporter’s notebook

Hijacked

Before he became one of AOPA’s most prolific writers and expert pilot, Editor at Large Dave Hirschman was a business news reporter for The Commercial Appeal and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. In that capacity he was one of the first to hear of the attempted hijacking of FedEx Flight 705 in April 1994. A disgruntled employee had taken the jump seat on the DC–10 departing the main FedEx facility in Memphis. Just 20 minutes into the flight the passenger violently attacked the crew with hammers and a spear gun, hoping to crash the aircraft into the FedEx facility. The three crewmembers were able to survive the attack with daring, courage, and teamwork as Hirschman recounts in his book Hijacked, which was published by William Morrow in 1997 but recently re-released with a new afterword from the author. Hirschman says this story is the most fascinating he has ever covered. —JSW