Book Information
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This podiobook is complete
Karl's Last Flight by Basil Sands
Fiction
EXPLICIT: Adult oriented themes, language and situations
Click the arrow below to listen to the first episode of this free audio book:
Karl Alexander had been an adrenaline junky for twenty five years. Whether flying Harriers in the Marines, piloting the shuttle for NASA, or as the chief astronaut for StrataCorp Space Flight he had always found his soul at five g's. But when a series of minor mishaps sends his ship crashing into the desert of an unknown country, Karl finds a new kind of adrenaline rush as he is swept into a raging torrent of potentially world changing events involving spies, insurgents, secret police, and an infamous Saudi millionaire terrorist that threaten to make his next flight, his last.
Read what a few of my readers at basilsands.gather.com have said about the text version of this audio podcast.
Yes, I am teary eyed! You are good! - Liz Rice-Sosne
This story reallly hold your interest like the really good book you don't want to put down. - Nancy C.
Wow. Sounds like one of those ripped from the headlines stories. I was instantly caught up in the story. - Barbara Brink
Basil, you are keeping me on the edge of my seat with this story! Every installment seems to have a little twist. - Tom C.
Sci-fi is usually very fantastical, but you make this story seem very realistic. Great story. You throw in plot twists at just the right time to keep it interesting. It always takes guts to kill off a main character. - Matthew Miller
Wow, Basil! You write in such a fashion, it feels like I am there with them! Gosh, I could almost feel the shots as they made contact...I could feel the blast as it happened! The jolt is tremendous as it hit...I could almost feel it! This is truly a well written book! I enjoyed it. Keep up your good work! - Dorothy Keller
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works- 3.0 United States License.
Audio Quality: 
Out of 14 ratings
Narration Quality:
Out of 14 ratings
Writing Quality:
Out of 14 ratings
Overall Rating:
Out of 14 ratings
By: EricsonR
Basil, I really enjoyed "68 Below" and "Karl's Last Flight". I enjoyed the character development and the pacing of both books. I felt as if I was right there next to Mojo and Karl when the action in the story came to a firefight. I'm so addicted to your characters and stories. I especially like the "interviews" with the characters--they're hilarious. I'm now trying to satisfy my fix by listening to "In the Shadows". Please keep the adventures coming.By: Woody
GOOOD stuff! Good plot, good narrative, love the accents funny as hell! Nice, fast paced action, and humorous. I would put Mr. Sands in the same league as Clancy and Follet. Currently listening to 65 below, and am very upset the ipod's battery died. Next time I'm in Barnes and Noble I will have look for other books this author.By: Keith
I just completed both Karl's Last Stand and 65 Below on the same day. Terrific writing, takes my mind away from my troubles. The only trouble now is that they have left me wanting more, NOW. I demand more, hurry up, I'm waiting. I always have nits to pick. It worries me, I don't have any for either book.
Chapters
| Title | Description | Date Created |
| Episode 1 (24.86 MB) | Chapter 1 Karl's space craft crashes in a desert after a number of mishaps that started immediately after takeoff. His passenger, a famous action movie star, pukes in his helmet and through his failure to pay attention in training, causes the ships computers to short circuit and enter the automated landing sequence. The actor dies on the way down to the earth and Karl is stranded. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 2 (20.15 MB) | Chapter 2 Karl is approached by three men who seem to be spies. One is a very oddly mannered, wise cracking Iranian named Kharzai who speaks perfect English with an Indiana accent. The second is a very large, muscular Irishman named Liam who is very light on his feet. The third is a dark and scary looking Frenchman named Gilles. They inform him that he is in Iran and then take Karl to their hide out after an Iranian jet sees them. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 3 (26.07 MB) | Chapter 3 Karl flashes back to 1985. He is a Marine Harrier pilot receiving orders for his first combat mission. He's being sent to retrieve a biological weapon recipe from a Spec Ops team in Burma by landing his Harrier in a very small clearing in the jungle. The place is crawling with Spetsnaz and Mujahideen, including a young Osama Bin Ladin. Chapter 4 Back in Iran, the hideout is an underground cave with an entrance on each side of a mountain. Inside they tell Karl the details of the situation and they receive their orders via satellite phone to move into their contingency plan of starting an insurgency operation within Iran to prepare for the invasion force. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 4 (21.95 MB) | Chapter 5 Back to 1985. Karl takes off in his Harrier and finds the landing in a small opening in the tall jungle canopy even trickier than he had anticipated. Once on the ground he is informed that the package has not arrived and it may be twenty minutes or so. He turns off his engine and climbs out where he meets two of the members of Team Vulture, the Delta Force team who is waiting for Team Cobra the package. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 5 (25.27 MB) | Chapter 6 Iran. The three spies formally introduce themselves as Kharzai a US born ethnic Iranian CIA agent, Liam and Irishman in Royal Marines assigned to MI-6, and Gilles a former Legionnaire and the hired gun of the group. They tell Karl that he can now either join their operation, or they can kill him. He decides to join them. Chapter 7 Burma 1985. After twenty minutes of waiting team Cobra arrives, but so does a team of Mujahideen (Muji's) and a firefight ensues killing most of the Delta team, several of whom are killed by Soviet snipers as they tried to get close enough to join the battle. A large number of Muji's are killed. Karl is knocked down by an explosion on his way to the plane and loses the package to a Muji. The Muji's take off with it into the jungle and the survivors of Vulture and Cobra try to regroup. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 6 (33.37 MB) | Chapter 8 Iran. As they drive, Karl thinks about his past and how he got to this point. After several hours driving they end up in a seemingly deserted town where they are supposed to find a safe house. They are ambushed in the town center and Kharzai is killed. The other three get away with shots being fired at them as they escape.. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 7 (31.71 MB) | Chapter 9 Burma 1985. Karl is trying to recover from the concussion of the rocket that nearly killed him as the teams regroup and plan their pursuit of the Muji's. Vulture One has been killed and Vulture Two, a fellow Marine, is now in command of the team. Karl checks out the plane for damage and finds a number of bullet holes, but no mechanical damage that he can identify. Chapter 10 Iran. Before dawn the three men drive off the highway to the top of a hill that overlooks a small modern city. Karl is told that his cover will be as a French fabric wholesaler who got trapped in Iran at the start of the war. After a few minutes of observation Liam and Karl leave Gilles as a lookout and enter the city while it is still dark. They go to a fabric shop just inside the city limits where Karl meets the stunningly beautiful Esther, he can't take his eyes off of her. Her father, Faisel, is the leader of the local resistance movement. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 8 (20.55 MB) | Chapter 11 Burma 1985. Karl and Vulture Two go to a designated waiting point while Team Cobra trails the Mujis through the jungle. At one point Karl loses sight of Vulture and panics until Vulture remerges, having killed two of the Soviet snipers who were tracking them and waiting in ambush. Once Cobra finds the path the Muji's are taking, Karl and Vulture go to join them in a sniper hide ahead of the trail. Chapter 12 Iran. Karl had taken a nap at Faisel'ss home. It is 4 PM and he has slept six hours. Esther is in the doorway of the bedroom with clothing in her hands for him. She explains they are her brother's, who was killed several years earlier because he would not convert from Christianity to Islam. She becomes irate with Karl when he says he understands her pain. She says he cannot understand. After the brothers beating she and her mother were raped and her father forced to watch. Her mother died of heartbreak after the ordeal. This is why she is so dedicated to toppling the regime. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 9 (21.97 MB) | Chapter 13 Iran. Karl joins Liam, Faisel, and another man named Manoosh in the living room as they discuss things Manoosh has seen at the local Air Base. There are several MiG with no markings that he believes have a nuclear payload on them. He thinks they are for a suicide bombing run in place of guided missiles because the Iranian government's missile guidance system has been destroyed by sabotage. They develop an idea to try and sabotage the jets with Karl's assistance. Chapter 14 Iran. After a meal, Karl and Liam leave the city to pick up Gilles and return. Once they reach the site where they left him, they see signs of another vehicle and a struggle that left a puddle of blood where they had stood earlier in the day. Gilles is gone. Out of the darkness Kharzai appears, his death had been faked to out Gilles as the double agent among them, and tells the other two that he saw Gilles leave with some Vevak agents. The blood was some other person that was executed there as a diversion. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 10 (30.52 MB) | Chapter 15 Burma 1985. Karl and Vulture are in a sniper hide above a small clearing through which a trail crosses. Cobra One gives the word that the Muji's are about to enter the field and Cobra's men along with Vulture pick their targets for a fast sniper attack. Each man hits his target except for one of the Muji's who manages to take cover with only an injury. Cobra One sneaks forward to finish him off, none of the other snipers can get a shot as the man is in a defilade. As Cobra approaches a grenade is tossed from the hole. He fires into the man, but the grenade kills Cobra One right after firing. Vulture descends and gets the package, recognizing the man in the hole as a young Osama Bin Ladin, shot through the midsection. Rather than finish him, he leaves him there to die slowly. They make their back to the plane. Chapter 16 Iran. The three return to town, dropped Kharzai off at the edge of the city to sneak in, since he is supposed to be dead and doesn't want to run into Gilles. Karl and Liam find that Faisel's shop has Vevak police who are beating the old man. Esther is not there. As they are standing by the door listening Karl is surprised by a man who steps from the alley and smashes his forehead with the butt of his pistol. The men inside come out to find their man in a heap in the alley and come rushing out, leaving the prisoner whom Liam and Karl rescue. As they run out of the shop, the Vevak chase them shooting. Kharzai appears down the street and covers their escape with Faisel. Liam is shot in the leg. Karl drives and picks up Kharzai. A high speed chase, with gunshots being fired ensues. They escape into an alley and get out. Kharzai drives off to ditch the vehicle, he is enjoying this adventure too much. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 11 (27.63 MB) | Chapter 17 Iran. In the alley a door opens, it is Esther. They enter a spice warehouse that is their designated meeting place in case of trouble. Esther takes care of her father and Liam's wound. Manoosh and Kharzai rejoin them and Manoosh says that there is a massive windstorm coming and the launch of the nuclear fighters has been moved up. Karl surprises himself when he unexpectedly shows his emotion for Esther, who he is inexplicably falling in love with. Faisel dies, then they all leave to go to the airfield. Chapter 18 Burma 1985. Karl, Vulture and the last member of Cobra make their way back to the plane. Karl has the package, a vial of the biological weapon, in his pocket. Halfway there they contact two Soviet snipers and kill them. They reach the clearing but don't go in yet. Karl stays put while the two snipers try to flush out any remaining Soviets. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 12 (16.35 MB) | Chapter 19 Iran. The return of Gilles. Karl Takes a stand. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 13 (22.92 MB) | Chapter 20 Burma 1985. The Delta's return Karl to his Harrier. But they're not alone. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 14 (18.86 MB) | Chapter 21 Iran. Kharzai leads the group out of the city and devises a plan to stop the enemy's assault. The plan doesn't sit well with Esther. | Jul 2, 2007 |
| Episode 15 (21.54 MB) | Chapter 22-23 Iran. Kharzai endangers Esther's life, turns on Karl. Esther faces her worst nightmare as Karl is forced to watch. | Jul 14, 2007 |
| Episode 16 (20.19 MB) | Chapter 24 Iran. The Iranian army tries to stop the spies from escaping, a nuclear armed jet takes off, Karl goes in pursuit. | Jul 14, 2007 |
| Episode 17 (19.82 MB) | Chapters 25-27 Iran - Karl joins an air battle with the two Iranian pilots. | Jul 14, 2007 |
| Episode 18 (21.57 MB) | Chapter 28-29 Iran. Karl fights the bad guys in the air, tries to save Esther. | Jul 14, 2007 |
| Episode 19 (23.85 MB) | Chapter 30 The Final Chapter: you'll just have to listen to see what happens. After final chapter there is a demo of my next book which will be coming out as a podcast in late summer / early fall 2007. | Jul 14, 2007 |
| Episode 20 (17.34 MB) | Bonus Episode. Interview with the Characters and the author.get to know them a bit | Oct 24, 2007 |
