A Pair of Wings

I'd never heard of Bess Coleman, the first Black woman to hold a pilot's license, before this novel, which vividly re-imagines her life. Sadly, Bess didn't live as long as she should have, dying in a flying accident, but this book hints at the fascinating life she did lead, connecting her to other famed Black people of her day, describing her travels and education in Europe, and her struggles to do what she wanted most of all: to fly. This novel serves as a great introduction to a fascinating and too short-lived figure as well as a compelling window into Black American life in the early 20th century.

Pilot Carole Hopson was surprised and inspired when she discovered early African American aviatrix Bessie Coleman. Bessie went from cotton picking with her mother, a former slave, to a manicurist in Chicago, to studying aviation in France. In 1921 she earned her pilot’s license, then took advanced training with a WWI German flying ace. Bessie’s dream was to establish the first American school for black pilots, but a fatal accident cut her life short.

But, what a life! Hopson capture’s Bessie’s determined and forceful personality. Achieving her dream meant taking menial jobs to save money, learning French and German, living frugally, and walking nine miles from her cheap lodgings to her pilot classes in France. We are impressed by show more Bessie’s will and her intelligence.

She lived in exciting times: the Great Migration of Southern blacks to northern cities; Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois offering competing visions for their race; Race Men replaced by the New Negro.

Bessie gained the support of the publisher of the most influential black newspaper, the Chicago Defender. She captured the heart of a wealthy real estate baron whose success was founded on marriage to the sister of an underworld crime boss. She meets entertainer Josephine Baker and the indomitable social activist Ida B. Wells.

Hopson’s writing is descriptive and detailed. I was interested in Bessie’s training and learning about early flight. Her barnstorming maneuvers were thrilling. Others will be sucked into her star-crossed, hot, love affair.

Thanks to the publisher for a free book. show less

This book is why I love historical fiction. I knew nothing about the aviatrix Bessie Coleman but now my brain and heart are filled with her challenges, desires, and courage exhibited to become a trailblazer. She is the first black female aviatrix in the early days of flying. In order to get her pilot's license she had to go to France, learn the language, and pass the tests there since no one would teach her in the U.S. She earned her license before Amelia Earhart. Bessie overcame racism, sexism, language barriers, broken bones, money issues, and more to fulfill her destiny. Back in the U.S., she performed barnstorming stunts around the country to share her love of flying in hopes that it would inspire other Black girls and boys to want show more to fly. Her life ended way too soon and in such a surprising way, I gasped as I was reading the book.
Kudos to the author for sharing this amazing woman with the world. Bessie was unstoppable. She was blessed with a wonderful family and some very smart sponsors who supported her throughout her flying years.
I highly recommend this book if you are looking for an inspiring story of another woman that has been forgotten in history. It is a little long, but the time to read this was so worth it. I will be thinking of Bessie Coleman for quite a while.
#APairofWings #NetGalley
Thank you to Henry Holt & Company and Net Galley for a complimentary copy. All opinions expressed are my own. show less

I really enjoyed this book. It had a great timeline (starts with a flight accident, then backtracks to much earlier, prior to Bessie’s flight training and follows through to her death), the character development was good and it covered many events during the time period with an aspect of persons of color.
The author wrote a very engaging story that I enjoyed.
It would’ve been even better with a few more pictures of Bessie through the years. I’m glad that I got to read about her and that she is not lost to history any longer with this excellent story.

I have always been interested in early aviation pioneers, especially women, and this book did not disappoint. Bessie is the first generation in her family to be born free, though her family still picks cotton in Texas for low wages. She is only about 9 when the Wright Bros. make their historic flight at Kitty Hawk, and that ignites her dream to fly. The first part of the book narrates her journey to Chicago to join her brothers and make a better life for herself. It is an educational portrait of African American life in the early 1920s in America. She makes friends and contacts in Chicago that help her to find a French flying school. She then has to go to France and learn French just to find a flying school willing to take an African show more American woman. She meets prejudice against African Americans and women at every turn, but perseveres in her dream to fly, and becomes the first African American woman to earn a civilian international pilot's license from Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. She even earned her pilot's license before the famous Amelia Earhart.

After learning to fly, and then learning aerobatics (also in Europe), she starts doing air shows in rented planes, only to be badly injured, almost losing her leg, in the first plane that was really hers. That plane was so cheap, it was not in good repair. She finally heals and gets back to doing air shows only to be tragically killed in an accident that was again a result of her not being able to afford a plane that was well-maintained even though she was an excellent pilot. The book demonstrates how Bessie will do whatever is needed to further her dream of flying and of inspiring her "people" to reach for their dreams even if they are told it is impossible.

What an inspirational story! She gave talks and plane rides as well as air shows, helping to ignite a desire to fly in many who knew her. She was also an inspiration to the author who became a commercial African American female pilot.

This is a work of fiction, but is true to history. show less

While the life of pioneering aviator Bessie Coleman is well worth the historical fiction treatment, I found myself really disliking the execution for some reason. Author Carole Hopson, a corporate pilot who founded a nonprofit to send more Black women to flight school, is clearly passionate about aviation and history, but Bessie’s explanations of things like the Great Migration or Washington vs Du Bois felt like footnotes shoehorned in from a textbook, not what a character living through those times would say. The writing was occasionally clunky and overwrought elsewhere, too, such as the romance sequences. Although I was unable to get swept away by the story, your mileage may vary.

A Pair of Wings is a novel based on the life of pioneer aviatrix Bessie Coleman. Arriving in Chicago in 1915 from Waxahachie, Texas, Coleman is among the first wave of African Americans to take part in the Great Migration, the largest movement of Black people fleeing the oppression of the agricultural South for greater freedom and the promise of jobs in the industrialized North.

Set in the 1915s, this historical fiction was a delight to read, and true to its historical timeline chronicling the great migration, systematic racism, and disparities. Real life figures, such as Jesse Binga, Oscar Stanton De Priest, Robert Sengstacke Abbott, Anthony Overton, Charlotta Bass, Olen P. Dewalt and many more.

The beginning of the novel was a dramatic show more intro into the story of Bessie Coleman. I was so moved by Hopson’s novel, at 9% of the book read, I decided that I wanted a hardcover copy for my library, so I brought it as a birthday gift to myself! I wanted to take my time and read it slow, to soak up every detail. The print was small for a 423 page novel.

I was awakened by the fact that Blacks were not paid as equally as their White counterparts, despite the unions and denied housing, so instead they purchased fancy cars to express their new found status. I witness the same in my day and time. Many African Americans are shut out of homeownership completely, so instead of houses they buy cars, the biggest, fanciest ones they could finance.

My grandfather was a Pullman Porter, and when my mother wasn’t attending school, usually during the summer, she would ride the railway system with him, while my grandmother ran a boarding home for teachers in Alabama. Hopson perfectly referenced airplanes to the time period as aeroplane. Hopsons’ description of emotions that Bessie felt during her first flight was so well written that you could feel her exact joy. Although this is a fiction novel, it is chocked full of historical people, places, events and things to the time period. Such as Juneteenth’s emancipation of Texas slaves, who waited two years longer than slaves in the rest of the country to know that they were free from bondage. At no point did the story seemed forced or drag on.

This story of Bessie Coleman is written in an entertaining and captivating way from cover-to-cover, including photos, and an extraordinary reveal that Carole Hopson is the sister to award winning and best selling author, Lorene Cary. What a great journey this novel took me on. Well written! show less