Interview with military/aviation writer Paco Chierici

Author Paco Chierici joins me today to chat a little bit about his new military thriller, Lions of the Sky.

Bio:

During his active duty career in the U.S. Navy Paco Chierici flew A-6E Intruders and F-14A Tomcats, deployed to conflict zones from Somalia to Iraq and was stationed aboard carriers including the USS Ranger, Nimitz and Kitty Hawk. Unable to give up dogfighting, he flew the F-5 Tiger II for a further ten years as a Bandit concurrent with his employment as a commercial pilot.

Throughout his military career, Paco accumulated nearly 3,000 tactical hours, 400 carrier landings, a Southwest Asia Service Medal with Bronze Star, and three Strike/Flight Air Medals.

Currently a 737 captain, Paco can often be found in the skies above California flying a Yak-50 with a group of likeminded G-hounds to get his dogfighting fix.

Prior to writing Lions in the Sky, Paco published extensively in Aviation Classics Magazine, AOPA Magazine, and Fighter Sweep, as well as creating and producing the award-winning naval aviation documentary Speed and Angels. He lives in Northern California with his wife and two children.

Welcome, Paco. Please tell us a little bit about you newest release.

A story of action and peril with intense and personal stories, Lions of the Sky propels us into a realm in which battles are won and lost in an instant and lives irrevocably changed in the time it takes to plug in your afterburners. Experience the challenges of women entering the world of naval aviation, the intensity of battle, and the razor-thin line separating a regional misunderstanding and a conflict between international superpowers.

What inspired you to write this book?

I wanted to begin the series with a Fighter Pilot Origin Story. The world of navy carrier aviation is so inherently dramatic and filled with outlandish personalities that I was looking to introduce the readers to it though the experience of a new class of F/A-18 Super Hornet students. The readers and the students experience the thrills and pitfalls of flying fighters from carriers together.

My female lead was inspired by a former squadron mate. She was an awesome pilot and human being. She was the first female F-14 Tomcat pilot and she was brave, funny, full of sass and attitude in all the right ways. Tragically she perished while attempting to land on a carrier. I always wondered what her life would have been like had she lived.

I’ve always loved thrillers with great characters, and naval aviation is a world perfectly suited to telling those types of stories. I draw on my experiences from a twenty-year career flying fighters and combine them with real-world global hot spots, in this case the South China Sea, to create a fun, exciting, dramatic thriller full of action and rich personalities.

Excerpt from Lions of the Sky:

Back in Silvers’ cockpit the same transmission was received, but completely ignored as background noise. She was too busy with her own problems to process someone else’s. As she and Wedge punched through 15,000 feet she pointed directly toward the threat sector while the radar scraped a path in front like a blade on a snowplow. Almost instantly it grabbed a lock on the bandit on their nose. “Got it, Wedge!” Her heart raced as she thumbed the radio switch. “Roman Two has contact; target, three-zero-zero at ten, seventeen thousand, hot; declare.”

The controller came back the moment she released her switch. “That’s your bandit.”

“Copy.” As she made the transmission and fingered the trigger to simulate shooting a missile, her radar warning screamed high warble indicating Air-to- Air radar lock on her Rhino. She was being targeted. The visual display showed a solid ugly strobe on her nose. “Roman Two, spiked!” she broadcast while simultaneously slamming the stick to the right and pulling hard. When the strobe was exactly down her wing line she reversed into an easy left turn to hold the bandit at her 9 o’clock. It was a nervous game of chicken; she was only ten miles away from an adversary intent on shooting her from the sky, but while she was perpendicular to his flight path, at this range, his radar would be unable to hold a lock. With no radar-lock, the missiles wouldn’t be able to guide against her. That was the plan at least.

She and Wedge were glued eyes-left outside the cockpit, searching the sky for the tiny spec that would be the F-5 at eight to ten miles. It would be nearly impossible to spot, skinny as a needle homing in on them. She gimbaled her head inside the cockpit every couple of seconds referencing the radar warning screen, confirming she was holding the strobe at exactly 9 o’clock. With every fiber of her body she fought the urge to pull hard to the left to face the threat head on. Her hands twitched on the stick.

As if he could read her mind Wedge shouted from the backseat. “Not yet! He won’t hold much longer.”

Sure enough, a heartbeat later the warble abruptly ceased and the strobe disappeared from her screen. “I’m in!” She pitched back 90 degrees left, pulling hard to get her nose in the proper piece of sky as rapidly as possible. She and Wedge both groaned as the Rhino was subjected to over 7Gs. Halfway through the turn her radar snapped a lock again. 30 degrees to the left at 3.5 miles. “Got him!” she yelled to Wedge.

The bandit was flying a vector that would take him past her left side. He had obviously lost her in the turn and hadn’t picked her up visually yet. She marveled at the fact, staring at the F-5 in the left corner of her Heads-Up-Display. She was entranced by the strange magic of finding an unfamiliar jet in this huge piece of sky. The details were mesmerizing, and coming into focus as she streaked ever closer: single tail, missiles on both wingtips, foreign-looking paint scheme.

Wedge’s voice broke her study. “Shoot it!”

She pulled hard once again to get the target directly on her nose. A ‘SHOOT’ cue appeared and she simultaneously pulled the trigger while broadcasting “Fox three, bandit seventeen thousand, left hand turn.” A digital counter appeared in her Heads-Up-Display at trigger squeeze, marking the seconds before calculated missile impact. The F-5 finally spotted her and banked hard to face her just as the counter reached zero.

“Kill bandit, seventeen thousand,” she transmitted, fighting the urge to yell in victory. Act like you’ve been here before.

“Nice job!” Wedge shouted from the back, but the celebration was brief.

“Break right! One more coming, two o’clock high.”

She snap-rolled her head, and the Rhino. “Got him.” She thumbed out countermeasures to decoy any missiles as her radar locked onto the new bandit. “Fox-3 on bandit at 23,000 feet.” She pulled the trigger then stared at the counter until it reached zero. “Kill two.” The second bandit flashed by her right wing 200 feet away at nearly 900 miles per hour combined speed.

On cue, the controller picked up his cadence. “Roman Two, copy splash two bandits. Green south. Nearest threat fifteen miles north.”

“Roman Two copies,” she keyed her radio. “Heading south for home.”

As she cleaned up the switches in her cockpit for the now-mundane act of flying home, Wedge’s voice came through her headset, “Nice job, Silvers.” She nodded silently, flushed with excitement and adrenaline, and forced herself to concentrate on flying the Rhino the short fifty miles back to El Centro. It was funny, something that would have thrilled her to the core just a few weeks ago now barely held her attention as she replayed the details of her engagement over and over. All too quickly the Rhino touched down, leaving her struggling to wipe the grin from her face before the canopy came up and the dry desert heat roiled into the cockpit.

What exciting story are you working on next?

I’m writing the sequel to Lions of the Sky. It continues many of the same characters in a new adventure titled, The Dragon. The story takes place in the Persian Gulf where Slammer Richardson’s faith in all he holds dear is put to the the test. He risks everything while dealing with ISIS, the Kurdish militia, and Iranian fighter planes.

It’s a story about discovering what you truly believe in, then fighting for it with your life.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

Great question, and not easy to answer. I’ve been writing my whole life. I’ve written articles for print and online magazines around the world. Lions is my first novel. Even now I hesitate to refer to myself as a writer. It’s a profession I respect and admire so much. As long as I have a ‘day job’ I’ll refer to myself as a pilot who writes.

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

I don’t write full-time, but I try to write every day, though I have a peripatetic lifestyle. Between my work obligations and family fun, I have a fairly full slate. On the rare day when I have no other commitments, I can devote many hours to dedicated creative writing. More usually I steal a couple hours on a layover or home before I’m dragged in another direction.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

Quirk? I don’t know, I write alone so it all seems normal to me. Probably the strangest thing is that I crank EDM music as I’m writing action sequences. The high tempo music helps get my adrenaline pumping.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I secretly wanted to be an author. I’ve been in love with the written word and storytelling since I can remember. It seemed so impossible and farfetched that instead I settled on becoming a fighter pilot. I’m glad it worked out the way it did. I’ve got a lifetime’s worth of material for all my novels.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

I’m an interesting amalgam of adrenaline junkie and bookworm. Though my books take place in a world of speed and action, I’m truly drawn to characters and the interplay or real people faced with important decisions. I write character centric thrillers where the reader feels as if they involved in the action. It’s an immersive experience into a world most people are superficially familiar with but actually know very little about.

Links:

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram

Thank you for your military service, and for being here today, Paco.

Interview with military historical author David McCue

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Author David McCue is here today to chat with me about his military historical novel, When Angels Wept.

Bio:

David McCue is a native of Southern Californian. Like Rod Hirsch, the hero in his novel, his parents were from Iowa and raised him with Midwestern values. He grew up in Palos Verdes, CA and graduated from California State University Long Beach. He and his wife live in south Orange County and have two sons. David is a WWII and Vietnam War era history buff with a particular interest in military aircraft. When Angels Wept is his first novel.

His interests are varied and include spending time with his family, reading, travel, landscape design, and vintage corvettes. He spent many years restoring the vintage 1970 Corvette he has owned since 1974. The time put into the restoration was well worth the effort. It won top in its class at the prestigious all Corvette Plastic Fantastic Car show in San Diego, the largest all Corvette show in the country.

He has been influenced by John Steinbeck, Pearl S. Buck and later Larry McMurtry, Herman Wouk and Mario Puzo among others. When he finished Wouk’s Winds of War and War and Remembrance, he recalls thinking they were “damn were fine books” and that they would stay with him forever. He says he got the same feeling after reading Stephen King’s The Stand.

“In writing When Angels Wept, I wanted my readers to take something away with them long after they had finished the book,” McCue says. “I wanted them to feel that the message contained within the pages was important and had merit. If readers feel that, I’ve done my job.”

Please tell us about your current release.

In World War I it was labeled “shell shock.” In World War II it was known as “battle fatigue.” Today most of us are familiar with the term “post-traumatic stress disorder.” No matter what the label, it remains the destruction of the minds individuals who experience traumatic events…typically events no one was ever meant to experience, like the unspeakable events of war. When Angels Wept follows the path of one such individual, an idealistic young airman named Rod Hirsch, who experiences the most absolute horrors of war during his time fighting in World War II. Hirsch has been raised with a respect for life and a belief in the rewards of hard work. The young man accepts his duty to his country without question. When he enters the Army Cadet Pilot Training Program and eventually becomes the captain of a B17 bomber, his inner struggles begin. Hirsch learns to deal with military life and the diverse personalities of the men in his charge.

There is more in store for Hirsch than just air battles and kills however. He also finds love while shopping for a special gift for his mother in a small bucolic English village. The moment he lays eyes on Shelly, a new layer of complication centers his young life.

Hirsch’s record of staying alive over the skies of Europe eclipses all other pilots’ until one day when he and his crew come up against an insidious evil his mind could never have concocted. After losing his entire crew, Hirsch’s grip on reality seriously wavers. The horrors of war begin a relentless invasion into his psyche, his mid-western values are compromised forever. Guilt rages and seeps into every fissure of his mind.

War indeed is hell, but for those with PTSD, it is a personal torment that no amount of medication can cure. So it is for Hirsch as the cracks between reality and horrid war-torn memories deepen and expand. His final break from reality comes when Hirsch uncovers the body of his love, bloodied and crushed by the rubble left by a rogue German bomb. Hirsch’s new focus is to find the bomber responsible German pilot and exact an unholy revenge.

While When Angles Wept chronicles the path to destruction of just one man’s life, the result of the effects of war that hundreds of thousands of soldiers experience today. The book takes readers through the insidious downward physical, mental and emotional spiral that post-traumatic stress disorder causes. You can’t see it; you can’t touch it; it has no taste or smell. PTSD is the mind’s own grim reaper that has just one, single purpose…to kill the human spirit over time.

What inspired you to write this book?

I’ve always had an interest in military history and military aircraft. For some reason, during a dramatic section of Yanni at the Acropolis, an image of American B17 bombers fighting the Luftwaffe during raids in WWII developed in my mind. By the time I got home a sketch of a story was spinning in my head. Although I was unprepared, not proficient at typing, spelling or punctuation, I started to write it. I guess it was just the number one item on my bucket list.

Excerpt from When Angels Wept:

A few blocks away, a boy on a bicycle peddled in their direction. Although the 13-year-old was never greeted warmly, everyone knew Harvey. His bike had a bent pedal that nicked the frame slightly, warning that he was coming.

As he rounded the corner, two neighbors talking over their fence abruptly stopped upon seeing him. They stared, wondering where he was going. They resumed their conversation only when he’d passed. Harvey wore no badge or uniform, but everyone knew his official capacity; he delivered telegrams, words cut from a teletype and pasted on to paper and sealed. Harvey’s first stop was Number 4 Market Street.

He rang the bell nervously. There was no response. The cable would have to go back in his pouch. As he hopped back onto his bike, a droplet of water bounced off his nose followed by more drops, making perfect half-inch circles on the pavement as he peddled toward Mill Road. Over the last several months Harvey had delivered countless messages from the War Department. He watched as the hearts of the entire community broke. Rod looked up the street and saw the boy peddling toward them. 

Shelly turned the same direction. Recognizing the boy, she gasped, forcing her attention away from Rodney. She drew her fist up to her mouth and said out loud, “Keep going. Keep going.” 

Harvey continued peddling toward them and stopped at the Waters’ gate across the street where Pam and her mother-in-law had just exited their house. Upon seeing him, their umbrellas spilled out of their hands. Mrs. Waters clenched her jaw and steeled herself. The rain began trickling off her nose and cheeks but went unnoticed. He confirmed the address, got off his bicycle, set it down and hesitated at their gate. Mrs. Waters recoiled. Pamela began whimpering and raised her hands to her face, obviously fearful of the approaching boy and the official telegram he carried in his hand.

Harvey approached slowly, avoiding eye contact. Mrs. Waters stood straight, balling her fists as if squeezing hard enough could will him away. “I have a cable for Mr. and Mrs. Edger Waters,” he said respectfully and extended his hand holding the cable uneasily. Alice hesitated. Her son was a navigator in the RAF. The news needn’t be fatal.

She grabbed the damp envelope. Her freshly curled hair, now soaked, lay flattened from the rain. The boy continued to look down as he retreated to his waiting bicycle. Harvey had barely ridden a few yards when he heard the women scream. The clicking from his peddling quickened as the boy pumped his legs harder, trying to put as much distance from them as possible. 

The cable was small, a few inches long and a few more inches wide. How could something so small upend people’s lives?

“Oh, it’s Hugh!” Shelly cried, “Oh no,” immediately running across the street, leaving Rod standing uneasily on the porch. The Waters were like family to Shelly.

At first, Rod wasn't sure what had happened. After a moment, he realized that Shelly’s neighbor had received word that their son had been killed. Rod was dazed. In an instant the warm glow of their time together had turned to ashes as the reality of the war invaded the sheltered place that they had occupied. 

Shelly needed to be with her friends. Young Pamela sank to her knees and buried her face in her mother-in-law’s apron. Rod, feeling helpless, turned to Shelly’s uncle and asked, “Harry, will you tell Shelly that I’ll write?” He wondered, “Which heart breaks harder, a wife’s or a mother’s?” The question had no answer.

For a few precious hours, they had shut out the war. Then this heartbreaking event smashed into their private world with a vengeance. Rod gave Harry a quick hug and left without another word. Turning up his collar against the morning’s rain, he looked back to see the three women locked together weeping, the telegram clutched in Pamela’s hand. 

The skies opened and the angels wept. 

Rod gazed at her through the deluge. Her soaked white dress clung to her tightly like a second skin confirming the fantasies he had about her figure. Now with her neighbor’s loss he felt self-conscious, almost guilty, about the way he’d lusted for her just minutes ago.

Shelly turned to find Rodney looking at her, but she could not see his eyes through her tears and the rain. Even in the rain she could still taste his kiss though. The white dress and what she said had lured him to her. There was never a thought of refusing him, and her knees had almost failed when his hands drew her into him. 

Rod waved.

Waving back silently, Shelly watched as he turned and walked away, his form fading in the gray of the rain. Would that be the last time she would ever see him?

What exciting story are you working on next?

The second book is titled, The Sins of Katherine Westbrook. Katherine is Shelly Westbrook’s mother, a spin-off character from When Angels Wept. She is smart, beautiful and has a head for business. However her personal life is ruins. She is an absolute failure as a mother and wife. After her husband’s death, she meets an American general and she is quite taken with him, however, her failures in her personal life haunt her. Her personal history with men is a disaster, so she can’t trust herself to open up to the general. Her willfulness is in opposition to her lack of trust in her own judgement and creates an interesting conflict that I felt I could develop.

 Thanks for being here today, David.