Born during the Great Depression of the 1930s, the author was brought up during the dramatic years of the Second World War, experiencing the Blitz, the V1 attacks on southern England, the excitements of D-Day and the end of the war in Europe and against Japan. It is hardly surprising therefore that he became fascinated by all things military and decided, long before he was old enough to join the Army, that he wanted to be a soldier.

This book describes Mike Reynolds's military career from private soldier to major general, a career that took him to the Far and Middle East, all over Europe and to North America. It was a life dominated initially by the Cold War and later by terrorist campaigns in Cyprus, Ulster and central Europe, the latter seeing him with six full-time military bodyguards.

But it was a life full of fascinating and extraordinary experiences such as commanding a company of eight platoons of infantry recruits at the age of twenty-four, jumping the rank of colonel to become a brigadier and, as a major general, commanding contingents from seven nations in what was nick-named the 'NATO Fire Brigade'.

He retired as the senior major general in the British Army.