An American could fly on a turboprop run by a regional carrier once per day and not expect to die in a crash for 8,000 years, according to one estimate. That"s small consolation to the 29 people who found themselves on ASA Flight 529 in 1995, when a faulty propeller cracked and destroyed one of their plane"s engines. As Gary M. Pomerantz notes in Nine Minutes, Twenty Seconds--the title refers to the length of time between the engine blowing and impact--"Of all the emergency checklists, there was none on how to fly with one wing." Pomerantz says his book is "not about a plane falling, but the human spirit rising." That"s only part right. Nine Minutes, Twenty Seconds has plenty of human-interest angles, but it mainly holds a morbid fascination akin to rubbernecking at the scene of a highway accident. Ever wonder what people do when they know they"re about to crash and believe they might die? Herein lie the answers. (Unexpectedly, they don"t scream.) Pomerantz conducted hundreds of interviews for this book, from the flight"s 19 survivors to family members of the deceased to the mechanic who refurbished the bad propeller before it went back on the plane. It is by turns interesting, poignant, and harrowing. Readers drawn to stories of adversity will find it riveting. --John Miller