Who's this Bill Leroy guy?
Wanted: Technical Advisor Extraordinaire!
So, I started online, finding every home page from every pararescue unit I could. I emailed each one, asking if there was someone that would be willing to be my technical advisor for these books. I promised that I wouldn’t pester them much, just wanted to make sure my facts were straight and that I had the right flavor, so to speak.
Crickets.
No one even emailed me back to say no.
So I went to work, reading everything I could find. Books, websites, you name it.
Enter Cowboy Bill
I’d just finished True Valor, the first book in the True Heroes series. I’d just started True Courage – book two.
Living in the high mountains of Colorado, in a town of 800 people, I sometimes went to the local coffee place to write. There I sat on this cool Autumn day when the door opened and in walked a handsome fellow wearing an Air Force flight jacket. He sat at the table next to me and sipped his coffee. I struck up a conversation.
“So, Air Force?”
“Yes,” he said. He was really very friendly. “Retired pilot.
“Really,” I said, trying not to over-react. “What did you fly?”
“Helicopters.”
Now I fought the urge to get up and Snoopy dance.
He continued, “I flew Search and Rescue.”
SCORE!!!
I gushed about what I was writing and he verified that he had, indeed, flown the PJs. Turns out he lived two doors down from me in the condos I lived in at the time.
We became fast friends. And, over coffee, we spent hours crashing a helicopter for the True Courage book.
Thanks, Bill.
Oh, and he agreed to write the intro to the Meet the 506th page. Go check it out. You’ll see why I love Bill Leroy!