At school I was good at English Language and writing short stories and poems. I didn't take up writing as a career because I wanted to fly aeroplanes - this I did achieve.

However, the written and printed word has always had a facination for me and I was trained as a Compositor (letterpress) for about 3 years after I left school. I loved it, but my sights were in the sky, flying where the birds are.

I served in the Royal Air Force for a number of years, mainly in the Far East - Singapore and Malaya principally. The area took my heart and my book, Pacific Odyssey - Lane's Story, is set in that part of the world, extending to New Guinea, Papua and Irian Barat.

Since my RAF days I have sold good wine, raced F2 and sports cars, studied Electrics and Electronics, got a Ham Radio Licence (G3VQM), been a Technical Sales Rep. and Sales Manager of an Electronics Manufacturer. I joined the Merchant Navy and learned to cook over a period of 12 years, did a bit of fishing in my 30ft boat, took up Corporate Video Production, gave all that up and reverted to being an electrician for the local council. I still do a bit of that although I officially retired some 11 years ago!! Now I just about have time to write more seriously and I hope my novel will prove to be viewed as such. I have other writings, some saucy and some humourus, but I won't go into that here.

Now I have attacks of Gout and Arthritis - a legacy of a misspent youth, as they say. Anyway, it has been fun and I hope to keep it that way for a long time yet.

Michael Harrington (the UK one, not the USA one by the way).