The book is a Force 12 hurricane, dropping only to a 10 gale now and then, for it sweeps one along breathlessly from incident to incident, place to place, name to name. From the arresting prologue itself, the book is brutally honest, exhilarating and even self-deprecating. It is a story that most of Young India must read, for it provides an incredible ring-side view to critical events in the 1980s and 90s that shaped the destiny of the nation. The author’s subsequent credentials as a military history writer, his earlier works and his vast exposure to virtually every part of the subcontinent, place him in a unique position to paint scenario after scenario where the reader is completely mesmerised by the cinematic unfolding of events. Which genre does this book fit into? This autobiography, however, doesn’t depend on his earlier works for its literary place: it is sui generis, defiant of classification. The nearest one can come to is to call it a thriller in the garb of a life story in the first person - for it is Shiv Kunal’s life story. And it reads like a thriller because it is incredible; the more so, because it is wholly true. His being the son of a distinguished general from a famous regiment may have helped, but not all army brats, however exalted, have this devil’s own luck. It is the kind of life most only dream of, and very few (if any) have the good fortune to live and write about. About the Author Born into an army family - more precisely 2 Rajput which was his father’s battalion - the author’s early childhood was tempered by the fact that most soldiers were then mostly away from home posted in field areas. Brought up under the watchful eye of a remarkable mother, after his initial schooling at St Joseph’s Academy and a year at Fort Benning in the United States, he was sent to the Doon School, an institution that would shape his entire outlook towards life. Having then graduated from Madras Christian College in Tambaram, his initial years were spent working with Tiger Tops Mountain Travel in Ladakh and Nepal. Subsequently a journalist, a film maker and a writer, he has worked briefly with India Today, the Associated Press and with Sanctuary Films before he teamed up with his associate Dipti Bhalla and formed KaleidoIndia, under which banner some classic films like Salt of the Earth and the Standard Bearers were shot and produced. In 1999 he filmed the Kargil War and in the last decade and a half, has authored some exceptional books that include the Northeast Trilogy, 1962: The War That Wasn’t and 1965: A Western Sunrise. He is now working on the seminal Value Education Program for schools that aims at bringing India to Indians especially at the school and college levels.