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Mike Trahan has written a book that really does something quite strange. It used to be a fact that a memoir would be a written account of the life of someone with a series of stories to tell. In modern times, post-1990 I mean, the memoir genre has been hijacked by every celebrity, near-miss pop star and TV personality in town. What has happened to stories of men who struggled against the odds to get to where they wanted to be?

Mike Trahan is what happened.

Now, that sounds a little dramatic– I grant you, I am rather dramatic. I got my copy of this book and I sat down expecting an interesting tale of a guy from Texas who got his wings and coped with life. What I actually found was the history of a time, a place, a family and the struggles and problems a family faced. Mike writes with striking honesty about his life– his father and his mother who raised him on a small farm over in West Orange, Texas. The man who would become Captain Mike Trahan started as just ordinary Mike who spent summers playing with his cousins and living off the land. This boy grew up poor, but never knew about poverty, because his family was so rich with love and devotion. He also left school at the beginning of eighth grade and didn’t look back. He just found another school, another route into his desired occupation. This book is not about great achievements, it’s not about fame– this book is about life, and most importantly, how you can deal with life.

Turning the pages, Mike writes as though he is telling you his stories over a beer and a smoke on a slowly closing day. You can feel the warmth of the love he has for his mother and the drive and ambition he had to reach his goal of being a pilot. You can pick any page of this book and you will learn something about Mike and in the process you will learn something about yourself. This is the real journey of life. Mike was lucky enough to know what he wanted from life– he took a fateful flight when he was fifteen and knew that he wanted to fly planes. So, Mike geared his whole life to fulfil that dream. He wouldn’t stop until he had his wings. That is the crux of the story. He didn’t sit back and say “I want to fly, but I am scared.” He looked at what needed to be done and he went straight ahead and did it. There were false roads and dead-ends of course. Mike spent two years on a football scholarship– it didn’t work out so he just changed schools and finished his education and jumped through the open window instead of banging his head on a firmly closed door. Trahan then found that he had a cyst on his tailbone– a cyst that would have made it impossible for him to join the forces. Did that stop him? You bet your ass it didn’t! He had it removed and bided his time until he could reconnect with his dream. Actually, this book isn’t really about flying or cysts or stories; this book is about finding your goal in life and creating acheivement. This book is about choices, actions, the ability to think for yourself and create your own future.

As you read The Gift you will be hooked by a book that has all the hallmarks of a touching and inspiring story. You will feel the love, the trials, the tribulations, the problems, the successes, the failures. You will discover a world that has all but disappeared now. You will hear stories of times long past; you will learn of a man who not only succeeded in his attempts, but he failed and he learnt from his failures. He didn’t give up; he didn’t say he couldn’t make it; he kept on going and going and going and going… He stood his ground and, sure, he hit the dust a few times, but Mike Trahan born in 1942 in West Orange, Texas, became Captain Mike Trahan after achieving over 600 hours of flying time whilst at college, whilst juggling his life, whilst living and breathing and striving.

For a guy like me, that’s a story I want to read. I know you will, too. Get the book and sit down and learn who the real Mike Trahan really is…and you may just learn something about yourself, too.

By Nick Wale

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“Pacy writing at its finest from the pen of Mark Biskeborn….”

 

I have just finished reading Mojave Winds: Second Edition by Mark Biskeborn. What can I say? Give me a few minutes to digest this one… It’s big… I have a lot to tell you.

I wonder if this is the first book that has been written about finding love in the desert? In case you’ve missed nature documentaries or planes recently– the desert is this big hot mass– just sand and bleached skeletons for miles around. So how do two people fall in love in such a place? Well, author Mark Biskeborn made it happen– he put two lost souls together on a bus and made them connect. Let me tell you about them. Sheila is a beautiful, talented Persian dancer who works in the best joints in Vegas. She has a huge void in her being, though– she feels like a trophy for men. It’s lucky for her that she meets freshly-discharged-from-the-army Kris Klug. The two meet and fall in love, but their love is endangered by the very fact that the bus they are traveling on is hijacked by drug dealers… What do the dealers want? I’m not going to tell you… But it isn’t sand!

Hooked yet? Well, it doesn’t end there. Kris is on the way to meet his Uncle Fred. Now, Fred is a wealthy trucking boss who wants to pass down the business. Before getting on the bus, Kris is told by a shady FBI agent called Jaeger that his uncle Fred may well have been involved in drug trafficking…

Are these two things related? Is Jaeger involved? Is Uncle Fred involved? What do the dealers want? What is Sheila doing on a bus in the Mojave desert? All these questions and more are asked and answered. Let me ask you… This is 386 pages of written work. Let’s take a few off for the front and back pages. Okay.. 380 pages. I normally read pretty quickly and try to review as quickly as I can. I ACTIVELY slowed myself down on this one. I slowed myself down to enjoy it and take it in. I wanted to prolong the experience because I was enjoying the experience. I am probably the only person in the world right now who is going to book tickets to visit the Mojave Desert, bleached bones and all. Here I come!

Hooked now? Hey! Let me tell you about the writing. ‘Detailed’ is a word I would use– detailed, but not boring. The writing is never boring. The story bounces– swings– smoothly narrates it’s way along. You can almost feel the heat of the desert. You can almost taste love dripping from the pages. The dialogue is never phoney, the story-line is never out-of-this-world. This is real life in book form in so many ways. Have you ever been in love? You will feel the bond between Sheila and Kris. Is this book dark? At times. I found myself hooked for the third time this week.  I don’t think I could ever put a Mark Biskeborn book down again. He has a real talent for getting a story across to a reader and adds those little flourishes that make the words as addictive as the drugs Uncle Fred is meant to be trafficking.

So what do I think? I think you should go buy this one! I don’t mean right now– I mean like a few minutes ago. I usually try to find fault in a book but this one makes it hard. If I have to find a negative, perhaps it is a bit long? But then the plot unfolds in such a way that actually the size is perfect. Open your change purse, folks, and go buy this one.

Mojave Winds: Second Edition is available on Amazon. Also visit Mark’s Author Page.

Reviewed by Nick Wale