Kirjahaku

This novel, written by a long time open cockpit biplane pilot and World War One History buff, explores the extreme physical and mental burdens placed casually on the shoulders of brave young men. In Jeremy's War we get into the mind of such a wondering young man, desperately well intentioned, and casually tossed to the hungry wolves. This is not some colourful, make-believe fairy tale featuring heroic, fearless men and beautiful, ever faithful women. On the contrary, we read not just about spectacular flying battles, aces swirling around one another in the eternal sky, but we also read of doubts and fear, of loneliness and bewilderment. We read of death and betrayal, cruelty and hypocrisy. The stunning cloud-flying sequences, transporting us up into a cold and solitary cockpit surrounded by unspeakable danger, are measured by the quiet despair of a broken man, lying alone and forgotten in a filthy room. The final ray of light, unexpected, yet deeply compassionate, leaves us with this reflection: Man is a survivor, despite all the odds.

Bob McCann, a soft spoken, wandering sky nomad, unexpectedly faces the ultimate challenges. Piloting a Hughes 500 across the Pacific, he must meet head-on with Dark Forces, fly like a madman, and coldly hunt like a falcon. The helicopter industry has always counted amongst its ranks this type of restless nomad. Not for him the large, lumbering, twin-engine, two crew helicopter 'school bus runs', mindlessly monitoring a fully coupled autopilot. Instead, in nippy, joyously single-engined craft and invariably single pilot, he delights in untamed frontier flying, often doors off. He tries to live in harmony with Mother Nature, his fellow Man, and, hardest of all, with himself. For Bob McCann hides, behind the bonhomie and the soft spoken exterior, a turbulent past. When Fate comes knocking and he meets the gentle woman of his silent dreams, their whirlwind romance is brutally cut short by dark storm clouds. Faced with the unthinkable, he is forced to call on a clinical coldness that hides deep inside him and enter a former homicidal mindset he hoped to never embrace again. Part auto-biographical and part fiction, this story weaves a web of intrigue and deadly danger.

Francis 'Moggy' Meyrick has spent a lifetime flying helicopters all over the world. He has interacted with many fascinating cultures, and delighted in the beauty of Mother Nature. In this book, you can walk a mile in Moggy's shoes. Wandering and wondering, starry nights, sunlit skies and holding hands, mild confusion and quiet compassion for Man and Nature, based on long hours flying in a glass bubble over endless vistas. You can share the comforting, constant, reliable, passing of blades overhead, the continuous, steady, mellow drumming, as we surrender to thoughts of All Our Mother. And, at night, lie gazing up at the stars of the Milky Way. In the first of these short stories, Moggy invites us to join him for a ride on his motorcycle. Where to? "I have no idea. I shall probably just point her nose into the rising sun. And go like hell." He describes the beauty of nature, from mountains to rocky shorelines, from birds around islands in the North of Scotland to fishes seen hundreds of feet below a fishing boat in mid-ocean. As a long-time helicopter pilot, he shares his joy in the views from his 'office in the sky' - and his sadness at losing so many of his fellow 'helicopter jockeys', his 'brothers'. He describes his introduction to 'the Whacky Races''(driving in America), and mischievously suggests that Tuareg ladies would make wonderful helicopter pilots. Not to mention the major impact their leadership style might have on corporate America. Moggy' spiritual confusions and confuddled experiences are recounted with a gentle humour. Often in what he calls 'doggerel verse': "A small man, rhyming, puzzling long Composing, two fingered, his feeble song..."

'Moggy's Tuna Manual' is based on five years of experience flying Bell 47's and Hughes 500's off Taiwanese and Korean tuna fishing vessels in the Western Pacific. Francis Meyrick describes the risks, the thrills and the beauty of nature. His stories include wry humour, first person accounts, and many cautionary tales. But his main emphasis is on safety: tips, anecdotes and techniques to fly safely and successfully. He dedicates his book "To all my tuna friends and in memory of too many guys who didn't make it home..." Francis has logged over 12,500 flight hours including a wide variety of helicopter applications all over the world. Based on this personal experience, his 'Tuna Manual' describes the many pitfalls that face raw, inexperienced recruits to the 'Tuna Fields'. Both low-time pilots and experienced pilots have praised this safety initiative as a sincere effort to mitigate the world-wide sky-high accident rate in the Tuna Helicopter Industry. Written with humility and respect for Man and Nature, this manual will appeal to all helicopter addicts.

When you mix one dreamy Irish Helicopter Pilot-Mechanic with a crew of Taiwanese, Chinese, Philippinos and Indonesians, you get everything - from confusion, to fireworks, to hilarity. In these true stories, Francis 'Moggy' Meyrick describes a wide range of personal experiences. Some are hilarious, some are hair-raising. When you go flying in those remote Pacific areas, it is inevitable that you also witness tragedy. In his previous book, Moggy's Tuna Manual, the emphasis was on Safe Operating Procedures. In Blip on the Radar he describes some actual occurrences that could have been fatal. But in his Introduction he also writes, "I count myself a fortunate man indeed to have seen, tasted, and flown the vast Pacific Tuna Fields. Roaming up to 50 miles away from my ship, long since disappeared over the horizon, I so often saw no sign of human existence. No ships, no islands, no people, no manmade structures. Only solitude, endless marching waves, and 'Mother Nature' in all her essence. With my blades slapping time, wind rushing by, and unseen gears steadily meshing. And the Eternal Sky, looking down - kindly, I believe - on a puny, mortal Man. In a sense, it was and is a paradise for any storyteller."