Far From Me Gives Voice to a Young Soldier
By Cecilia Nasmith/Today’s Northumberland
What must it have been like to be a young man in Australia hearing that war had broken out against Germany, and bursting to do your part – even though you’re only 15 years of age.
Port Hope author Adrian McLean has heard the tale, from his own father, and has now shared it in his new book Far From Me.
Young Keith McLean was that Victoria schoolboy, hearing that Neville Chamberlain had declared war, “wide-eyed at the news and bursting to hear what his schoolmates make of it” (according to the book’s back cover).
“The book tracks his journey after signing up for the Australian Air Force, and he lied about his age like everyone did,” author McLean related in a recent interview.
“He kind of got drawn into the myth of the war and the drama of the war and the propaganda about the war in Australia.”
It would be a few years before he could lie about his age convincingly enough to sign up.
Meanwhile another young man named Johnny, living in Perth, received the news somewhat differently. When the war broke out, he had only been married for six months.
“It was terribly traumatic, torn between duty to his country, which he felt very strongly, and devotion to his new wife,” the author said.
The paths of the future best mates crossed three years into the war during training in Montreal, followed by a dangerous Atlantic crossing and an introduction to life in besieged wartime England. They end up in Southern England on a rookie crew that ends up flying Lancaster bombers as wireless operator and tail gunner.
For McLean, Far From Me is a long-awaited opportunity to share a cherished family story.
“I’ve got his notebooks, which is fantastic, and I’ve got his stories he told me, which is really what kicked me off on this journey,” he said.
“They’re not the sort of stories I would have expected about the war. They’re both shocking and poignant.
I thought they would make a good story, a damned good story.
“That thought was kind of sitting with me in the background for several years until, in 2015 or -16, I received in the mail from my brother-in-law in New Zealand a CD with a recording made by my father when he was 19 years old in Montreal – the only recording I have of my father’s voice, a message to his mother back in Australia.
“It was a very beautiful moment to hear, knowing he was about to embark on a very dangerous crossing of the North Atlantic. And he knew if he made it, he was going to end up flying Lancaster bombers over Germany, which was even more dangerous.”
Making it an historical novel was an exercise in reverse engineering.
“You think, ‘Crikey, how on earth did that happen. What had to be the circumstances that led up to that?’” he related.
“Having to figure out how on earth did they end up here – that was a wonderful invitation to find a story that made sense when it wasn’t an obvious thing from the start.”
And there’s a poignancy in the mythos that surrounded these soldiers arriving in London – and in many cases finding romance.
“I could see my parents in a very different light when I describe their meeting and falling in love. I found it extremely moving, and I saw them so differently afterwards. So writing the book has changed me, and in part the book is an homage to my father.
“The circumstances he went through were very, very challenging, not just the flying risks – which were extreme – but also the misery of wartime and the conditions they had to endure, the culture they had to adapt to.”
McLean’s background as an academic with an interest in anthropology meant he brought an anthropologist’s eye to the exercise.
“If you want to understand a culture, you have to understand it through the small details of the culture. I realize in retrospect you have to incorporate many of the small details of that time in history,” he said.
Part of his inspiration in striving for detail is to provide an historical record for his grandsons.
“It’s unimaginable to those boys today, who can’t live without a cell phone in their hand, to understand a world where no one had a cell phone. My grandmother had no electricity in her house.
“It was a very, very different world I was trying to evoke and describe.”
Now available for pre-order on Amazon, the book is published by Austin Macauley Publishers, with a Feb. 27 publication date.
There’s also a chance to meet the author at a launch in Cobourg. This will take place March 1 at 2:30 p.m. at the Reader’s Nook, and everyone is welcome.
