| Flight of the Intruder by Scott Purdy |
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Well, you ask, why is this guy bothering to rehash a novel that was published twelve years ago? I happen to feel that most simmers have quite literary minds; one need only creep around the web for a while to see some of the glorious, creative pages filled with illustrations and even "war-stories" that have sprung up around the games we enjoy.
Think about it: basically what we're doing when we load up a game is constructing a fiction, like a writer, entering a vivid and continuous dream in which we play out the role of a pilot of one of these slick death-machines, aircraft with so much thrust and bristling with so much weaponry that they reduce a grown man to patriotic tears. Plus, with all these bugs included free with sims these days, it takes a healthy imagination to stay immersed in our virtual worlds! If you like flight sims, my guess is this novel will appeal to you. On a more personal note, I treasure this book because I was lucky enough to get one of the early first-edition copies-no kidding! I was at the time living in Colorado and my mother heard on the radio that this obscure Stephen Coonts guy, a former Naval aviator who was then living in Denver, was signing copies of his (still unknown) Flight of the Intruder at a local bookstore. We went over to the store and there was Coonts himself at a table full of first-edition hardbacks, absolutely alone. No one was paying any attention to him; he was still just an unknown writer, but he was nice enough to strike up a conversation with me about Navy flying. I must admit I didn't know anything about the A-6 at that point-I was twelve years old. It would be a couple more years before I was up to absorbing all the Clancyesque descriptions in this novel of technical data pertaining to the A-6. (Now, certain movies popular during that time period had put the idea into my head that, upon graduating, I was going to Annapolis and I was going to fly the F-14 Tomcat into the face of our erstwhile enemies, the Russians. Heartbreaking, isn't it? I even got up every morning and did a little set of push-ups, pretending I was in a cramped cabin aboard the U.S.S. Eisenhower.) |
You remember that time: Reagan was still in power-there was a kind of majesty in the air over the sheer power of the U.S. Navy-tension was high with the Soviet Union. Little did I know back then that the closest I would ever come to carrier qualification was with the bored-sounding LSO of Jane's ATF, telling me to "Go left, go right . . ." as I shamelessly over-corrected on my great lumbering approach to that dangerous heap of graphics, floating in the disturbingly planar ATF ocean. Anyway, Coonts was kind to me and he inscribed on the first page of my book, "To Scott Purdy - hope a young aviation enthusiast like you gets a kick out of this little Navy flying story. Best Wishes, Stephen Coonts." Hey, people, tell me that's not pretty cool- this was all before Coonts knew he had a bestseller on his hands. We're not talking prose on the order of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Gogol, here; this is just a good compelling tale of air combat over Vietnam. It's a patriotic text on certain levels, and also manages to throw some light on the mistakes our leaders made in that war. Beyond all that, it's a pilot's story: the fear in waiting for the next mission, the adrenalized rush of a low-level attack, the moral uncertainty these guys faced, the bitter knowledge that they might never come home. If you haven't read this gem-an aviation classic-do yourself a favor. To order this book go to Military Combat Top Picks You can also write to Scott Purdy. A-6 fans see also: Discovery Keyword: A-6 Vietnam.
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This material is copyrighted and may not be reprinted in any form without permission of the publisher. Last Updated May 22nd, 1998 |
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