The Aviator and the Showman

Amelia Earhart, George Putnam, and the Marriage that Made an American Icon

De: Laurie Gwen Shapiro

Narrado por: Stefanie Powers

A Smithsonian Magazine Best History Book of 2025 • An NPR Book We Love 2025 • A New Yorker Best Book of the Year So Far • A New York Times Editors' Choice • CBS Sunday Morning Summer Book Report Pick • New York Times “Books to Read in July” • A Town and Country Best Book of July • An Amazon Best Book of July • A Barnes & Noble Best Book of July • A LitHub Best Reviewed Nonfiction in July • A BookBub Beach Read Pick • A New Yorker Best Book We Read This Week • Southern CALIBA and MIBA Regional Bestseller

“Laurie Gwen Shapiro has dug deep into the archives, and emerged with an exhilarating tale of the adventurous life of Amelia Earhart and the remarkable relationship that helped to forge her legend. Yet Shapiro goes even further—stripping away the myths and revealing something far more profound and intricate and true. The Aviator and the Showman is one terrific book.”
—David Grann, New York Times bestselling author of The Wager and Killers of the Flower Moon

The riveting and cinematic story of a partnership that would change the world forever

In 1928, a young social worker and hobby pilot named Amelia Earhart arrived in the office of George Putnam, heir to the Putnam & Sons throne and hitmaker, on the hunt for the right woman for a secret flying mission across the Atlantic. A partnership—professional and soon otherwise—was born.

The Aviator and the Showman unveils the untold story of Amelia's decade-long marriage to George Putnam, offering an intimate exploration of their relationship and the pivotal role it played in her enduring legacy. Despite her outwardly modest and humble image, Amelia was fiercely driven and impossibly brave, a lifelong feminist and trailblazer in her personal and professional life. Putnam, the so-called “PT Barnum of publishing” was a bookselling visionary—but often pushed his authors to extreme lengths in the name of publicity, and no one bore that weight more than Amelia. Their ahead-of-its time partnership supported her grand ambitions—but also pressed her into more and more treacherous stunts to promote her books, influencing a certain recklessness up to and including her final flight.

Earhart is a captivating figure to many, but the truth about her life is often overshadowed by myth and legend. In this cinematic new account, Laurie Gwen Shapiro emphasizes Earhart’s multifaceted human side, her struggles, and her authentic aspirations, the truths behind her brave pursuits and the compromises she made to fit into societal expectations. Drawing from a trove of new sources including undiscovered audio interviews, The Aviator and the Showman is a gripping and passionate tale of adventure, colorful characters, hubris, and a complex and a vivid portrait of a marriage that shaped the trajectory of an iconic life.

Interesting, yet the main characters, empty shells

The book, well written, well researched, well narrated. The book is a myth buster. Necessary. The main characters, profoundly uninteresting & unsympathetic. The 1930s equivalent of the empty shells who populate the front covers of supermarket tabloids, People & Us magazines & the like. The endless fascination about Earhart’s disappearance can stop now. She was utterly ill equipped & ill prepared for that round the world flight. She knew it, her husband knew it too. Unfortunately she took her nice navigator down into the vast Pacific with her due to her own incompetent decisions.

Well researched

I liked the accuracy and disliked the length because it appeared to present all information with the same weight. Summarizing similar incidents could have better presented George in a shorter space. I felt like I got to know him better than Amelia. I’d rather not know him but he is integral to her story!

Getting to know Amelia Earhart.

I can’t really think of anything. The book was very well written, it came me a deeper understanding of race in America and how that drives everything.

Well Researched, Well Written

Shapiro fills in many important gaps for those of us who have basic knowledge of Amelia Earhart. No matter what my thoughts and feelings are immediately after finishing the book, I am aware that the author, part detective, part journalist—both archetypes committed to truth—did a masterful job. Although I have enjoyed following the many stories of those still searching for Amelia Earhart’s plane, this book grounds me in the reality that the simple truth of this aviator’s end is probably the likeliest: she crashed in the Pacific with Fred Noonan and died. The plane is probably at the bottom of the ocean. Continually resurrecting the search for Amelia’s plane is a way of refusing to let go of someone we love.

One repeated theme of Earhart’s lack of experience early on, and later, her lack of vital training hours, explains much of Amelia’s luck, and later, her final misfortune. Amelia also refused to stay up-to-date on aviator communication skills; she seemed flip about this, too, in spite of how nervous she was about locating Howland “island” (really a tiny spit of land in the middle of nowhere). Her ending is a series of poor judgement calls by her as well as those around her, all done while hurrying to finish so as to rake in cash during the 30s.

Finally, the very detailed story of George Putnam as Amelia’s promoter is much appreciated. Amelia was ambitious, really wanted to continue flying, and this union solved that problem. However, her constant public appearances cost her time in the air for practice, or even for joy. Ultimately, her persona as a champion of women’s rights is her legacy, and a gift to all of us, even today.

Long lists of friends and acquaintances that only people living in the 1930’s would recognize or care about.

I enjoyed the flying parts which is why I bought it. The reasons for the problems in the last chapter surprised me but I won’t reveal them here. The author needed an editor, or should have written two books. One about Amelia, the other about Putnam and the literati.