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The Ace
The Ace is a sweeping story of four Americans caught up in aviation history of the war. The central character, John King, is a young first-generation American who is the target of hatred and prejudice by his neighbors suspicious of his German heritage. The course of his life is radically altered when Captain William Carpenter crashes a test plane in King’s neighborhood, and King pulls Carpenter from the burning wreckage. Thaddeus Slater is a ruthless power-hungry Congressman who clears see the opportunity to make a fortune and advance his career through the war and its need for aviation. Mary Lou Whitting is a beautiful young heiress to a Main Line Philadelphia fortune who struggles against her guilt over unearned riches and an exasperating love for the strange, taciturn, haunted John King. Each of the four becomes unwittingly drawn into crisscrossed relationships as King reluctantly rises to renown as an aerial warrior.
- GenresHistorical Fiction
300 pages, Paperback
First published September 15, 2008
16 people want to read
About the author
Jack D. Hunter
26 books9 followersHunter was born in Hamilton, Ohio, on June 4, 1921, the son of Whitney G. and Irene Dayton Hunter. Ironically, while his father, whose long career with the Du Pont Company began as a paint color evaluator because of his sensitivity to colors, Hunter was red-green blind. He graduated with a BA in journalism from Penn State University in 1943.
During World War II, Hunter joined the U.S. Army, but when he could not recognize the color of flares or follow tracer bullets he was transferred to counter-intelligence in a move that spared him the fate of most of the others in his infantry class — death on Omaha Beach during D-Day.
Because he spoke German, having taught himself and then studied it in college, Hunter was sent to Germany just after the war ended. The Allies had discovered that some high-ranking Nazis had gone underground and were waiting until the political atmosphere settled down, at which point the Nazis would infiltrate the new German government. As a 24-year-old lieutenant, Hunter, disguised as a Lithuanian black marketeer, engineered a sting called "Operation Nursery", which resulted in the arrest of over 1000 Nazi plotters in a single night. He was awarded the Bronze Star.
"Operation Nursery," including Jack Hunter's role in it forms the basis of the nonfiction book The Axmann Conspiracy: The Nazi Plan for a Fourth Reich and How the U.S. Army Defeated It, Berkley Books (Penguin), Sept. 2012.
After the war, Hunter worked in various journalistic capacities, as a public relations executive for Du Pont, and as a speech writer in Washington D.C.
His first novel was 'The Blue Max', and the publisher remarked that, as a new author, they would not spend the money to have an artist paint a color cover for his book. Hunter, who often dabbled in water colors, volunteered to paint it himself. The publisher liked it and used it, and Hunter considered that cover painting to be his first "sale". He then turned what was once a hobby into a second career as an aviation artist.
Hunter was the author of 17 novels, his last being 'The Ace', which was published on October 1, 2008. Like The Blue Max, which is still popular after 44 years, 'The Ace' deals with World War I aviation, but focuses on the human costs and chaotic conditions that belabored the Americans in their need to build a world-class air force virtually overnight.
During the 1980s, Hunter served as the writing coach for reporters working at the (now defunct) Jacksonville Journal and for the Florida Times-Union, which still publishes in Jacksonville. In this role, which continued three days a week for 10 years, Hunter provided encouragement, tutelage and support to hundreds of journalists, some of whom went on to work at The New York Times, The Denver Post, The Miami Herald and in many other venues.
He lived in St. Augustine, Florida, until he died at age 87 on April 13, 2009.
During World War II, Hunter joined the U.S. Army, but when he could not recognize the color of flares or follow tracer bullets he was transferred to counter-intelligence in a move that spared him the fate of most of the others in his infantry class — death on Omaha Beach during D-Day.
Because he spoke German, having taught himself and then studied it in college, Hunter was sent to Germany just after the war ended. The Allies had discovered that some high-ranking Nazis had gone underground and were waiting until the political atmosphere settled down, at which point the Nazis would infiltrate the new German government. As a 24-year-old lieutenant, Hunter, disguised as a Lithuanian black marketeer, engineered a sting called "Operation Nursery", which resulted in the arrest of over 1000 Nazi plotters in a single night. He was awarded the Bronze Star.
"Operation Nursery," including Jack Hunter's role in it forms the basis of the nonfiction book The Axmann Conspiracy: The Nazi Plan for a Fourth Reich and How the U.S. Army Defeated It, Berkley Books (Penguin), Sept. 2012.
After the war, Hunter worked in various journalistic capacities, as a public relations executive for Du Pont, and as a speech writer in Washington D.C.
His first novel was 'The Blue Max', and the publisher remarked that, as a new author, they would not spend the money to have an artist paint a color cover for his book. Hunter, who often dabbled in water colors, volunteered to paint it himself. The publisher liked it and used it, and Hunter considered that cover painting to be his first "sale". He then turned what was once a hobby into a second career as an aviation artist.
Hunter was the author of 17 novels, his last being 'The Ace', which was published on October 1, 2008. Like The Blue Max, which is still popular after 44 years, 'The Ace' deals with World War I aviation, but focuses on the human costs and chaotic conditions that belabored the Americans in their need to build a world-class air force virtually overnight.
During the 1980s, Hunter served as the writing coach for reporters working at the (now defunct) Jacksonville Journal and for the Florida Times-Union, which still publishes in Jacksonville. In this role, which continued three days a week for 10 years, Hunter provided encouragement, tutelage and support to hundreds of journalists, some of whom went on to work at The New York Times, The Denver Post, The Miami Herald and in many other venues.
He lived in St. Augustine, Florida, until he died at age 87 on April 13, 2009.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
May 13, 2016
While this novel had a lot of interesting themes around First World War aviation --- e.g., the embryonic development of the U.S. aviation industry, the influence of politics upon said industry during the 1917-18 period, and the effects of combat on the average fighter pilot in France --- I did not like it. The story seemed to be loosely structured with sketchily developed characters who served as little more than consumer products for endorsing the story’s themes. I really wanted so much to like this novel, as it was Jack Hunter’s last. (His first novel, “THE BLUE MAX”, another First World War aviation novel I avidly read as a teenager, remains as one of my favorites of the genre.) But “THE ACE” proved to be ultimately unsatisfying.
August 20, 2023
It was interesting reading ww1 fiction. I’ve read a lot more ww2
December 30, 2011
I enjoyed this audiobook. More contemplative than what you might expect from a novel with this title, I found the character studies intriguing in the context of their time. WW1 is the great forgotten war given the ferociousness of WW2. Considering that there are no surviving veterans that saw active service, we depend on memoirs and novels to relay the horrors of this particular conflict. The main protagonist is John King, a recruit with emotional baggage. The secondary characters comprise corrupt pols, seasoned vets and well heeled, good hearted ladies. All in all, a good read.
January 7, 2013
A US Air Force friend of mine loved this book. Definitely a 5 star read to him. So I'm putting it on my To Read shelf, but going with the 5 stars since he loved it so. :)
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews