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.

On the day the Cold War reached its 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 two missing U-2 planes. The first belonged to Chuck Maultsby, a former POW and combat pilot who had inadvertently steered into Soviet airspace on a secret mission. The second plane was piloted by Rudy Anderson, who was in the midst of another top-secret mission to find evidence of Soviet missile sites in Cuba. If any of these three men made the wrong move, the Cold War could turn nuclear.

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