Cassada

A tragic and passionate portrayal of human conflict. Obscured by low, brooding clouds, two lost planes drift ominously beyond their landing strip and over the heads of the men below. A former enlisted man fresh out of flying school, Lieutenant Roberto Cassada is the latest arrival in a complacent Air Force squadron in Cold War Germany. From the outset, several characteristics alienate Cassada from the tightly-knit group of men he joins: his mysterious reticence, his Puerto Rican birth, and - most damning of all - his unabashed ambition. In the absence of warfare, Cassada struggles to prove his superiority as a pilot on routine flying procedures, one of which leads to the tragedy at the centre of the novel. Cassada is a reworked version of Salter's The Arm of Flesh, originally published in 1961. Brilliantly paced and deeply haunting, this is a novel that explores the tensions of a group of fighter pilots in conflict with themselves and each other as much as with any enemy.