As a final aside, I love the design of these books and how good they all look together on the shelf!

Captured and tortured, he was paraded on television provoking worldwide condemnation and leaving one of the enduring images of the conflict. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. John is a member of The Royal British Legion's Gulf War Group helping veterans with Gulf War Syndrome and a patron of the British Ex-service Wheelchair Sports Association. Spitfire, Lancaster, and Tornado all followed the same format of using the often fascinating stories of those involved to tell a bigger story, and Eject! For John Nichol to produce this book must have taken nerves of steel and a huge chunk of mental toughness, backed by massive friends and family support.

Without doubt by its very nature there must be a constant battle between aircraft/missile performance and the safe deliverance of aircrew from an aircraft that is too fast, fatally compromised, too low, spinning too much, taking cannon shells or is on fire and for this reason no doubt work will continue. John is the best-selling author of Tornado Down, five novels, and the highly acclaimed WWII history books, The Last Escape, Tail-End Charlies and Home Run. He has taken the time to let the reader know that he has taken that ride, but hasn't fallen into the trap of the book being about him.

At its end I could only reflect on the nature of war and the risks we ask our pilots to take on and whether technology will advance so much that seat technology will be rendered obsolete with pilotless aircraft. Packed with interviews with aircrew who know exactly how it feels to 'Bang Out' from an aircraft at high speed, both in peace and in war, the book gives the reader a vivid sense of what that life-saving experience feels like, but also features the moving accounts of what happens next, from the viewpoint of both the crews and their families, who often have little or no information about whether or not their loved ones have survived. In Germany, Heinkel had fitted their turbojet-powered fight He-280 with a catapult seat escape system, and on January 13 1942, the Luftwaffe’s Wolfgang “Bombo” Schenck became the first man to use an ejection seat in an emergency. You'd think that all the stories would get samey- banging out of an aircraft- but they really don't. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.

No one would ever want to have to use an ejection seat, but thank goodness some people have – and have lived to tell the tale. I had the notion,” wrote Martin, “that I wanted to design things and not be employed by anyone” – a fine ambition.

Nichol is perhaps at his best in his account of the early work of the Martin-Baker Aircraft Company, the pioneering British manufacturer of ejection seats, whose products – as of the date of publication – have saved 7,681 lives. Nichol tells the remarkable tale of how the ejection seat was first conceived during the Second World War as countless lives were lost in accidents and in battle. I especially liked the way several airmen’s and navigator’s stories were interwoven through the book as it progressed.If I had a any criticism at all, it would be that the people who maintain these seats day in day out get short shrift- this is all about the occupants. Captured, tortured and held as a prisoner of war, John was paraded on television, provoking worldwide condemnation and leaving one of the most enduring images of the conflict. Most works of popular narrative non-fiction could be written by anyone with a small amount of talent, as well as enough time, energy, commitment and a decent library.