Customer Reviews

Solo: My Adventures in the Air (Shannon Ravenel Books)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I read this book because I love Edgerton's novels and hoped to gain insight into the author's life and writing. The book did not fulfill this hope. It's not an autobiography-it's the story of Edgerton's love affair with flying at different stages of his life. However, even though the book did not provide me with what I had hoped, I enjoyed it and recommend it to others.

The book is thematically divided into four parts. The first describes Edgerton's training to be a fighter pilot and his growing obsession with flight. It starts with a trip to an airport at age four and ends when Edgerton is sent oversees as a combat pilot. For me this part was not compelling, because I have no interest in flying. There are long and technical explanations of such things as thrust and trim. In some sections, it reads like a manual. You can skim through this part, just to get a flavor of the training and of the determination that Edgerton had to fly, but it's not of interest to the general public in my opinion.

Next comes a section devoted to Edgerton's combat career in the late sixties and early seventies in Japan (flying nuclear-readiness missions) and then in Vietnam/Laos, flying combat reconnaissance missions. I enjoyed this section very much. Edgerton is able to convey the feeling of control and freedom, the thrill of flying. He also describes the clammy fear of combat. The best section describes a failed recovery attempt of pilots whose aircraft was shot down. Edgerton's description of his growing desperation and sadness as he realizes that nothing can be done for the lost pilots is moving. Edgerton earned the Distinguished Flying Cross for his valiant and persistent efforts to help the downed pilots, despite coming under anti-aircraft fire.

The most interesting aspect of the combat section is the essential theme/conflict of the book. Edgerton gamely faces up to the disconnect between the experiences of the pilots and the result of their actions. For the pilots the Vietnam experience was, by and large, a huge thrill, a power trip and a dream come true. Despite the fear, Edgerton and his fellow pilots loved flying and were empowered by their experiences. They spent precious little time considering the impact of their actions. They never really considered the death and destruction they caused. As a marture adult, Edgerton tries to make sense of this disconnect. He can't resolve the problem, but he engages with it. I was surprised that he was not able to see that governments for millennia (and even now) are able to go to war because they CAN exploit young men's natural thrill seeking and lack of moral experience. It would be much harder to send forty-five year olds to pointless wars <smile>.

The third section of the book deals with Edgerton's flying experiences after he left the air force. I found this section of little interest, but I think a flight enthusiast might feel differently.

In the final section, Edgerton ponders the above mentioned moral conflicts and muses over the nature of courage. This is an excellent section and makes the entire book worth reading. It could and perhaps should have been expanded further.

I enjoyed the book, but it does not compare with the brilliance of Edgerton's novels. In his novels, every word is in place - they are perfectly crafted. This book has too many words and not all of them are needed. There is some humor, but Edgerton's brilliant use of satire is entirely missing.

I was also disappointed that Edgerton chose to share so little of his life with us. Although he mentions his parents frequently, he shares next to nothing about his childhood. Nor do we learn much about his adult life. There are little facts thrown in, but no background with which to interpret them. This weakens the book. Read Tony Hillerman's recent autobiography and you'll see what I mean.

I was a little surprised at Edgerton's lack of engagement with religion, since much of the book is about a moral dilemma. He mentioned being a churchgoer when younger, but devoted no time to what I think must be addressed when thinking about morality and war.

You may recognize Clyde Edgerton's name: he's written eight previous novels but here provides a compelling saga in SOLO: MY ADVENTURES IN THE AIR, a biographical memoir which provides the true account of his flying experience, from Air Force training and combat missions in Vietnam to his own personal plane. The joy Edgerton holds for planes and flying shines from every chapter: any with an affection for planes will love this celebration of flight, which holds a healthy dose of military aviation insights.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

Solo, by Clyde Edgerton, could have been a great book about flying. Edgerton's experience in aviation along with his obvious life long passion for flight, combined with his post-flying resume entry of Professor of Writing and the University of North Carolina (Wilmington) should have been the recipe for the best book of flying since Rinker Buck's Flight of Passage. Unfortunately, it is not. That stated, this is a good book that aviation enthusiasts will likely forgive Prof. Edgerton's flaws and enjoy its quickly passing pages.

Solo begins slowly with a rather poor explanation of flight and flight controls for the non-pilot reader. It reads as some dated and poorly written instruction manual. Edgerton should have just stuck with his suggested reading mentioned in the Author's Note of Wolfgang Languisher's timeless "Stick and Rudder". My sense in that most who will want to read this book either know about the basics of flying or don't care and just want him to get to his jet training and his rediscovery of the joy of flying general aviation "taildraggers" later in his life. A good one third to one half of this book reads more like a diary then a work of a military pilot, trained also as a writer. Ah, but the second half . . .

Solo literally soars in the second half, dealing with the writers training in military fighter aircraft in the Vietnam Era and of his experiences in that environment. Edgerton also nails the rediscovery of flight later in life in small and slow general aviation aircraft. He writes clearly and beautifully on what all of us in the aviation community know about flying - it almost doesn't matter what you fly, as long as you fly. Here is a fighter pilot accustomed to F-4 Fantom jets, the premier fighter of its day, falling in love with a Piper 2 seater with an engine half the size of most of today's cars. Unfortunately for all readers, just when building to this crescendo and dénouement he falls back to listing seemingly nonsensical and peripheral logbook entries and spoils the end.

As a pilot and flight instructor, my predisposition was to enjoy this book and, by and large, I did. But that was only because my blinders allowed me to get past his very obvious poor and disjointed writings. As with too many books a couple of more critical edits could have made this a must read. I would say it is a fun, quick read but only for those who have a real passion for flight.

My father and I have the same last name, we are both pilots and we have both read SOLO by Clyde Edgerton. That's were we parted company. My dad liked it. I did not.

Imagine the movie AMERICAN GRAFFITI after you cut out hotrods, drive-ins, and cute girls and replaced them with characters rehashing their collective driver's training experiences. Then you would have SOLO: MY ADVENTURES ON THE GROUND.

SOLO is a dull book so stuffed with filler that it could have been sold as a pillow. It contains pages of walking around a plane and explaining every part; pages of flying a plane and explaining every control; pages of the author's old letters home; pages of transcribed audiotapes; pages of anecdotes that never quite become interesting, pages of dialog that convey little meaning.

Only two stories were memorable:

The first story struck me because it typifies the style of book and underlines its major fault: only cookie-cutter characters populate Edgerton's universe. Readers are first introduced to fellow fighter pilot Rob on page 150 only because Edgerton needs to tell of his death on page 151. Worse, Edgerton tells the story as a laundry list of facts without apparent emotion or empathy. The sum total of Edgerton breaking the news to Rob's fiancé on page 152 is, "I sent a telegram to Lynda and then wrote her a letter."

The second story suprised me because it demonstrated that Edgerton can tell a story well when he wants to. Taking nine pages instead of his usual nine sentences, Edgerton does a great job of conveying the tale of two downed pilots he helped search for while on duty in Vietnam. Neither pilot was found. Much later in life, Edgerton discovered that one of the missing pilots had survived the war as P.O.W. while the second remains missing to this day.

Unfortunately, one interesting story does not make a book or justify its purchase. I gave 2 stars out of respect for Edgerton's service to his country and because I save 1-star reviews for the truly awful. If I were giving it a letter grade though, I would give it a D- because Mr. Edgerton earns his living as a professor of creative writing and should know better.

In short, a more accurate title would have been: SOLO: MY SINGLE INTERESTING ADVENTURE IN THE AIR.

I suppose if you are a pilot, hearing Edgerton re-tell his own experiences learning to fly would be pretty interesting. If you're just interested in planes, the book is just OK. If you're looking for a good story you'll be deeply disappointed.

About 1/3 of the book is learning to fly one plane after another. About 1/3 is an attempt to make sense out of his service in Vietnam. The remaining 1/3 is filler with an occasional anecdote, sometimes interesting.

What is so surprising is how clumsily the text is written and how little he has to say. I think maybe he wrote this book too long after the fact. The Vietnam war was a long time ago, and his memories have faded.

This book is probably the best written book I have read this year. It is an example of a book written by someone who knows their subject matter well. Edgerton has a way of making you feel as though you are a fly on the wall of the cockpit.
He used this skill to guide us through his flying years, be it when he was watching planes at the local airport or when he was commanding pilot over the jungles of Vietnam.
I would recommend this book for anyone who has an interest in aviation or good writing. I particularily enjoyed this book because I have an interest inflight and it is always great to hear and read about someone who has done something with the dream.
This is one great book.