Runway success

It’s little surprise that G.R. Gopinath’s autobiography is Simply Flying off bookstore shelves. According to publisher Harper Collins India, the 380-page work by the founder of Air Deccan, India’s first low-cost airline, sold 30,000 hardback copies in just three months. “I had no intention of making it a bestseller, but I always knew it would have a great response,” says soldier-turned-entrepreneur-turned-author Gopinath. His editors say he approached his latest venture with such gusto that he turned in over a thousand pages in his very first draft. Its success is comparable to Nandan Nilekani’s Imagining India: Ideas for the New Century (Penguin), which sold 60,000 hardback copies in its first year.