A highly engaging memoir of flying the not-so-friendly skies.
An airman recalls his brushes with death—including four crashes while serving as a fighter pilot—in this sharply pitched World War II memoir.
Born in Vancouver but raised in England, Gilman enlisted in the Royal Air Force at the tender age of 18. Even before entering combat, he learned that flying could be a deadly proposition. One friend perished in a fiery wreck during a training flight. Another survived a crash but suffered terrible burns; he later committed suicide. In the book’s most unsettling episode, a pilot with engine failure glided to a smooth landing on a deserted beach. But he failed to retract his landing gear, as per regulations, so the wheels stuck in the sand; the plane flipped, and he drowned in the rising tide. Gilman was equally vulnerable to the whims of fate and technology. While chasing a German fighter over the North Sea, his Spitfire’s radio went dead. With zero visibility, blackout conditions and no return course, his death seemed assured. But quick thinking and an alert lighthouse keeper steered him back to the land of the living. More a matter of luck was his surviving a midair collision with another pilot. As usual, Gilman narrates the horror of his crash with a mix of incredulity and bemusement. Of losing all his teeth when “the microphone at the end of my oxygen mask had gone through my mouth,” he looks on the bright side: “My last ever dental appointment was 78 years ago.” Such generosity of spirit is typical from the author, whose strange-but-true tales are a worthy addition to first-person accounts of World War II. Crisp prose and laconic humor bring the book’s collection of hair-raising stories to life, as do his well-chosen black-and-white photographs. Gilman rarely gets caught up in the jargon of the cockpit, and in pursuing his personal story, he avoids the lethargy of potted history. If readers don't acquire a deeper appreciation for the sacrifices made by the so-called Greatest Generation, they’ll at least come away with extra gratitude for the safety features of modern aircraft.
A highly engaging memoir of flying the not-so-friendly skies.Pub Date: Nov. 23, 2012
ISBN: 978-1770972766
Page Count: 136
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: July 5, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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