SILENT SKIES
an investigative thriller
What really happened on Flight 8414?
What would a meticulous investigation reveal – beyond the official explanation?
Was it technical or political failure that led to the disaster?
Was it calculated – or was it an attack?
When a Germanair plane crashes in the French Alps, investigators and the media present a seemingly clear explanation: the co-pilot deliberately crashed the plane. But for Sophie Thalberg, a journalist and former partner of the co-pilot, this picture does not add up. She begins her own investigation and uncovers a deliberate cover-up. The deeper she digs, the clearer it becomes: it wasn't her ex-boyfriend who was the problem. It was a system that needs someone to blame – whatever the cost.
Together with Till Gorny, a security consultant with a military background, she follows the trail behind the official narrative: missing data, manipulated evidence, political interests, orchestrated lies. What they discover leads far beyond the crash – deep into a system that shapes and destroys truth as it serves its purpose.
SILENT SKIES is a literary political thriller about love and loss, about truth and lies – and about how much courage it takes when the whole world believes in a story that isn't true.
The novel is inspired by the real crash of Germanwings flight 4U9525 in March 2015. However, it deliberately breaks with the prevailing suicide theory and asks: What if we were told the wrong story back then?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Sam Thorne is a German pseudonym. The author has worked as a journalist for several decades for major media companies in the areas of analysis, strategy, and storytelling, with a background in print, online, radio, and TV journalism, law, aerospace, the arms trade, and international politics. This work has taken him to crisis zones, courtrooms, and numerous public and confidential archives.
"Silent Skies" is the first fictional feature-length project following several successful non-fiction books and inter-nationally award-winning documentary film productions developed with high standards of content authenticity, dramatic rigour, and linguistic quality. The book is based on a story that no one wanted to tell.
——Quotes
“"...Thorne crafts a thriller that challenges not just the facts of one crash, but the machinery that produces truth in the aftermath of disaster. The novel's strength lies in its methodical deconstruction of how official narratives form and solidify before evidence can interfere. Sophie's investigation reveals a pattern of premature conclusions, missing data, and curious omissions that suggest either staggering incompetence or deliberate misdirection. Technical experts point to anomalies in flight recorder data that should have triggered deeper investigation but were instead dismissed or explained away. The passenger manifest itself becomes a source of mounting unease as Sophie discovers that several travelers were not who they claimed to be, their presence on that particular flight raising questions no one seems eager to answer. Each revelation builds upon the last, creating a momentum that pulls the reader deeper into a world where aviation technology, international intelligence, and corporate interests intersect in ways the public is never meant to understand. Thorne excels at depicting the media ecosystem that transforms speculation into accepted fact, showing how certain journalists become conduits for official leaks while others who ask uncomfortable questions find themselves marginalized or threatened..."”
- 648 pages
- Paperback
- 6in × 9in
- Black & White
- 978-381943762-5