The highly praised author of The Joy of Pi now turns his clever technical and mathematical expertise to the conundrum of flight. Everyone who has ever sat in an airplane has had this same thought at some point in their lives, perhaps every time they fly: "How is this plane ever going to get off the ground?" The Flying Book explores flying through history, physics, anecdotes, sidebars, and illustrations mankind's fascination with flight. From the earliest efforts to fly five millennia ago to today's extraordinary flying machines; from the physics of flight (a relatively obscure, completely non-intuitive property of physics is so powerful that the wings of a Boeing 747 can lift over 700,000 pounds into the air with little effort) to the science of turbulence; from the strangest aircraft ever invented to a peek into what the aerospace industry has planned for the future — The Flying Book will offer comfort and entertainment to those anxious about flying, and enlightenment to all who read it.