Book Reviews

Title: Love at First Flight
Author: Captain W. Stewart (Bud) Orr USN (Ret.) and Fran E. Orr
Genre: Memoir
Reviewer: Hodge Wood
ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 1938231538

Love at First Flight is the memoir of by two outstanding Americans: a courageous naval pilot, Bud Orr, whose career spanned twenty-seven years, and his loving wife, Fran. This volume is an honest, beautifully crafted story of Bud and Fran's inspiring relationship, a testament to their deep love and service to their country. It is a page-turning account of a sterling military career, complete with adrenaline-filled descriptions of a daring pilot flying many dangerous missions in advanced warplanes. Love at First Flight is a powerful reminder about the real sacrifices that men and women in the Armed Services must make to preserve a relationship, and the incredible rewards that come with that sacrifice. Like a catapult launch off an aircraft carrier, Bud and Fran's story will propel readers through recent history—from the Vietnam War to current day America. A tender, moving, and inspiring volume, Love at First Flight is the perfect gift for any military member, military family, or military historian.

Title: I'll be in the Fourth Grade Forever
Author: Maria Ruiz
Genre: Memoir
Reviewer: Barbara Peacock

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 1475041748

A memoir of years from 1942 to 1953 as seen by a young girl who was transported from California to war torn Europe to Kansas with her army officer father.

Title: A Quest for Skye
Author: John Rothdiener
Genre: Literary Fiction
Reviewer: Joe Epley

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 0985252332

Doctors Morgan and Tammy Hamilton take a vacation from their pediatric clinic in Saint Paul, Minnesota to board a cruise ship for the Caribbean. Devastated by Tammy’s third miscarriage and the news that she will never be able to bear children, the couple hopes to use the fourteen day cruise to regain their emotional footing. But life has other plans for them.
Among the passengers is Skye, a nine-year old girl with an irrepressible spirit, and a passion for living that touches everyone around her. Infused with hope and a belief in a loving God, Skye becomes the daughter that the Hamiltons could never have.
But despite her open and honest nature, Skye is surrounded by ominous questions. Was the accident that killed her parents truly an accident? Or was it sabotage? Why are news reporters hounding this innocent child? What secrets are concealed in the laboratory clinic on the island of Kardia? The truth—if they ever find it—can bring a government to its knees, and thrust national power into the hands of men who will not hesitate to shed the blood of innocents.
The Hamiltons are drawn into a struggle to protect the little girl they’ve come to love. As everything they value begins slipping away from them, these hardnosed and pragmatic doctors suddenly find themselves praying for a miracle.
When the miracle comes, it’s not at all what Morgan and Tammy have in mind.
Because Skye has been praying too...

Title: Eyes Right
Author: Tracy Crow
Genre: Memoir
Reviewer: Bob Doerr

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): B007IPQ4XC

Just out of high school in 1977, her personal life already a mess,
Tracy Crow thought the Marines might straighten her out. And sure enough, in
the Corps she became a respected public affairs officer and military
journalist—one day covering tank maneuvers or beach assaults, the next
interviewing the secretary of the navy. But success didn’t come without a
price.
When Crow pledged herself to God, Corps, and Country, women Marines were
still a rarity, and gender inequality and harassment were rampant. Determined
to prove she belonged, Crow always put her career first—even when, after
two miscarriages and a stillborn child, her marriage to another Marine
officer began to deteriorate. And when her affair with a prominent general
was exposed—and both were threatened with court-martial—Crow was forced
to re-evaluate her loyalty to the Marines, her career, and her family.

Eyes Right is Crow’s story. A clear-eyed self-portrait of a troubled teen
bootstrapping her way out of a world of alcoholism and domestic violence, it
is also a rare inside look at the Marines from a woman’s perspective. Her
memoir, which includes two Pushcart Prize–nominated essays, evokes the
challenges of being a woman and a Marine with immediacy and clarity, and in
the process reveals how much Crow’s generation did for today’s military
women, and at what cost.

Title: Sword of Shiva
Author: Jeff Edwards
Genre: Thriller/Mystery
Reviewer: Sandra Linhart

ISBN (links go to the MWSA Amazon store): 0985044381

A SINGLE SPARK CAN IGNITE A WAR THAT CONSUMES THE WORLD.

Three Tibetan rebels attack a train carrying Chinese soldiers into the Tibet Autonomous Region. The rebels escape across the Himalayas into India, unaware that the son of China’s First Vice-Premier lays maimed and dying among the burning wreckage of the train.

As an escalating series of retaliations drive China and India toward outright war, hostilities spill over into the sea, and the Bay of Bengal becomes a crucible of naval warfare.

The president of the United States orders a U.S. Navy strike group into the area as a stabilizing force, but the situation between the two nations has already deteriorated beyond any hope of peaceful resolution.

With Asia hovering on the brink of annihilation, a small force of U.S. warships must defeat the Chinese Navy to preempt the coming firestorm.

The fuse has already been lit…