Bird Dream
Adventures at the Extremes of Human Flight
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4.7 • 6 Ratings
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
PEN / ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing (2015 LONGLIST)
“[P]erversely entertaining... In a truly intoxicating read that was hard to put down, Matt Higgins has managed to make real a world about as far removed from daily life as it gets.” --Daily Beast
"Matt Higgins cracks open this astonishingly dangerous sport and captures the spectacular adrenaline surges it delivers."--The Wall Street Journal
"[R]iveting... a must-read. A highflying, electrifying story." --Kirkus (STARRED)
A heart-stopping narrative of risk and courage, Bird Dream tells the story of the remarkable men and women who pioneered the latest advances in aerial exploration—from skydiving to BASE jumping to wingsuit flying—and made history with their daring.
By the end of the twentieth century BASE jumping was the most dangerous of all the extreme sports, with thrill-seeking jumpers parachuting from bridges, mountains, radio towers, and even skyscrapers. Despite numerous fatalities and legal skirmishes, BASE jumpers like Jeb Corliss of California thought they had discovered the ultimate rush. But all this changed for Corliss in 1999, when, high in the mountains of northern Italy, he and other jumpers watched in wonder as a stranger—wearing a cunning new jumpsuit featuring “wings” between the arms and legs—leaped from a ledge and then actually flew from the vertiginous cliffs.
Drawing on intimate access to Corliss and other top pilots from around the globe,Bird Dream tracks the evolution of the wingsuit movement through the larger than life characters who, in an age of viral video, forced the sport onto the world stage. Their exploits—which entranced millions of fans along the way—defied imagination. They were flying; not like the Wright brothers, but the way we do in our dreams.
Some dared to dream of going further yet, to a day when a wingsuit pilot might fly, and land, all without a parachute. A growing number of wingsuit pilots began plotting ways in which a human being might leap from the sky and land. A half dozen groups around the world were dedicated to this quest for a “wingsuit landing,” conjuring the pursuit of nations that once inspired the race to first summit Everest.
Given his fame as a stuntman, the brash, publicity-hungry Corliss remained the popular favorite to claim the first landing. Yet Bird Dream also tracks the path of another man, Gary Connery—a forty-two-year-old Englishman—who was quietly plotting to beat Corliss at his own game. Accompanied by an international cast of wingsuit devotees—including a Finnish magician, a parachute tester from Brazil, an Australian computer programmer, a gruff hang-gliding champion-turned-aeronautical engineer, a French skydiving champion, and a South African costume designer—Corliss and Connery raced to leap into the unknown, a contest that would lead to triumph for one and nearly cost the other his life.
Based on five years of firsthand reporting and original interviews, Bird Dream is the work of journalist Matt Higgins, who traveled the world alongside these extraordinary men and women as they jumped and flew in Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas. Offering a behind-the-scenes take on some of the most spectacular and disastrous events of the wingsuit movement, Higgins’s Bird Dream is a riveting, adrenaline-fueled adventure at the very edge of human experience.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Matt Higgins has covered adrenaline-fueled pursuits on land, air, and sea for publications like The New York Times and ESPN Magazine. A fascinating investigation of the so-called Wingsuit Landing Project, Bird Dream opens with a simple question: “What kind of person not only approaches the edge, but then leaps off?” Higgins follows two fearless rivals—attention-loving California playboy Jeb Corliss and steely, fortysomething British stuntman Gary Connery—as they race to complete the world’s first high-altitude landing without a parachute. Exploring the extreme edge of modern sport, the journalist goes to hair-raising heights and visits thrill-seekers around the world. The perilous details of the wingsuit showdown are riveting, but the lasting pleasure of Higgins’ story lies in his insight into his subjects’ deep-seated desires to challenge human limitations.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A new tribe of aerial daredevils write their deeds in blood and glory in this bracing if windy extreme sports saga. Journalist Higgins sings the exploits and charisma of "wing-suit" pilots, who leap from airplanes and high places and glide through the air in a nylon getup that gives them the shape and aerodynamic advantages of a flying squirrel. His loose narrative follows two wing suiters in their quest to become the first to land (safely) without a parachute: mediagenic superstar Jeb Corliss, bald and resplendent in an all-black outfit with silver skull buttons, wants to build a million-dollar landing slope; meanwhile, his rival, Gary Connery, an unknown stuntman, conceives a bargain-basement scheme to land in a pile of cardboard boxes. The book is mainly a chronicle of death-defying stunts: mishaps are plenty grisly when wing suiters traveling at 100 mph encounter anything denser than air, and the body count is high. It's also an inchoate tribute to the exaltation of defying death; one extreme parachutist "felt somehow reborn into the world" on his first outing, "as if scales had been stripped from his eyes." These effusions won't move everyone to a conversion experience, but Higgins's account is hair-raising enough to hold the reader's interest.
Customer Reviews
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Great for friends and family
Excellent Book! A must read for all readers (not just extreme sports enthusiasts)
Bird Dream is a must read! Higgins’ research and writing gives readers a glimpse into the wingsuit/BASE jumping world that most people would never know about otherwise. The book covers the history of the sport, technical aspects, culture and why these people are driven to take such risks. It’s a well-rounded look at the sport and the people (who are from all over the world) involved. I enjoyed reading about the personalities of the wingsuit pilots and how they got their start flying but reading all of the details about the jumps and flights of Jeb Corliss and Gary Connery really grabbed my attention.
Higgins’ writing style is perfect for the subject and his vivid details and descriptions gave me a great mental picture of some of these feats. Finally a book that fully describes these sports and has something appealing for readers with varying interests…… especially for anyone who has ever watched any wingsuit/basejump/skydive video ever.