Author: Stephen Rodrick
Year: 2013
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Non Fiction
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A moving and powerful story of love and sacrifice, fathers and sons, heroism and duty, soldiers and the families they leave behind, in which a writer-the son of an accomplished Navy pilot killed on duty-uses his own experience to illuminate the triumphs and tragedies of a life in military service.
On November 28, 1979, accomplished Navy pilot Peter Rodrick died when his plane crashed in the Indian Ocean, leaving behind a devastated wife, two daughters, and a thirteen-year-old son.
In The Magical Stranger, Stephen Rodrick explores the life and death of the man who indelibly shaped his life, even as he remained a mystery: brilliant but unknowable, sacred but absent-an apparition gone 200 days of the year for much of his young son's life-a born leader who gave his son little direction. Through adolescence and into adulthood, Rodrick struggled to fully grasp the reality of his father's death and its permanence. Peter's picture and memory haunted the family home, but his name was rarely mentioned.
To better understand his father and his own experience growing up without him, Rodrick turned to today's members of his father's former squadron, spending eighteen months with VAQ-135, "The World-Famous Black Ravens," as their duty took them around the world and thousands of miles from home. As he learns more about his father, he also uncovers the layers of these sailors' lives: their loves, friendships, dreams, disappointments-and the consequences of their choices on those they leave behind.
A penetrating, thoughtful blend of memoir and reportage, The Magical Stranger is a moving reflection on the meaning of service and the power of a father's legacy.
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