Above Average

Naval Aviation The Hard Way

By: D.D. Smith

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

Revised and updated version! STEPHEN COONTS, NY Times best-selling author of Flight of the Intruder -- “D. D. Smith's personal memoir of his years in naval aviation is more than a ‘I was there’ tale. He captures the myriad of challenges that was Naval Aviation before the Vietnam War. When I arrived in the fleet, D. D. Smith and his compadres were the squadron execs or COs who led us nuggets into the inferno of Vietnam… A huge tip of the hat to D.D. Smith. This book will appeal to every naval aviator or NFO of whatever era. Highly recommended.” But the book is much more. It is a cleverly written and refreshingly honest story of the author’s life and times as he fights his way from rural Minnesota to the blazing skies over North Vietnam. Commander Smith flew 138 combat missions and made more than 800 carrier arrested landings. As the Navy’s first Chief Test Pilot, his tests in the F-14 led to the first EVER flat spin in a Tomcat – and it nearly killed him. No swaggering bravado here; this is a fresh, insightful look at life, luck and guts – in Vietnam and beyond.

Awesome Story

Enjoyed listening to the life story of one of the quiet heroes of this country.

Don’t like AI Narrator

Love this story. This era of pilots are the greatest this Country will ever know. These were the bad a$$es

Excellent life story!!!

Ai reading didn’t handle the abbreviations and acronyms vey well. Just a bit distracting. Very interesting life story!!!

Would have been good if not for the terrible robot narration

It is a testament to the quality of this book that I stuck around to the end despite the absolutely abysmal, 1980 vintage robotic narration. Mispronunciation, awkward timing and horrible intonation made me want to return this 5 minutes in, but I recognized that it was going to be a good story.

Interesting remembrance, horrific narration

Aviation fans will enjoy Smith’s recounting of his flying career. Some interesting details about the various planes he flew, particularly the A-7.

Or the Aaahhhhhseven, as the moronic AI narrator calls it. Sometimes. This is a perfect example of a book to illustrate how bad AI narration can be. Between its inability to not even butcher pronouncing airplane models and military ranks consistently (sometimes it’s an Ayfore, sometimes it’s an afore, occasionally it’s actually an A-4; let’s not even get into how confused it is by JOs…) to its Vulcan-like unemotionally during the most harrowing or frustrating moments Smith encountered, this AI’s performance is a testament to the value of even the most mediocre human narrators. It was almost funny it was so consistently bad, but not quite. After all those hours, it was just annoying.

TL;DR:
Readers: Good book for aviation fans. Read it on paper or Kindle.
Audible: Please don’t sell AI narrated books.