Ocean Ridge author Bill Finley and his novel, Air Force Cowboy. Photo provided
By Mary Jane Fine
Oh, does Bill Finley have stories to tell! About his growing-up years in a Chicago tenement. About his Uncle Jack, who taught him at 16 to fly a Piper Cub. About meeting Anita, his wife of 36 years now, in Miami. About his Army Air Corps service during World War II.
Ah, yes, those war years: the basis for Air Force Cowboy, his 496-page novel, self-published in October.
His Uncle Jack was the inspiration for the book’s daredevil stunt pilot, BlackJack Hosmer, whose son, Lori, is the book’s hero.
So, uh, is Lori a thinly disguised stand-in for Finley himself?
“Anita says I am,” he demurs, “but I’m not smart enough.”
Finley’s modesty may just match his energy level. He wrote Air Force Cowboy in one year — “Whenever I have an hour, that’s where I am” — and he’s already on page 265 of his next novel, which is about the moon. Uhn-uh, no more details, except to say it involves a shocking discovery by an astronomer.
A 3-foot-tall poster promoting Air Force Cowboy occupies pride of place, alongside windows overlooking the ocean in the second-floor living room of the Ocean Ridge house he had built 24 years ago. In the years since he and Anita have filled the home with contemporary sculptures and fiber-art wall hangings and eye-catching mobiles.
On a wall in his office hangs a framed picture of his wartime crew and, beneath the photo, five service medals honoring his years with Moller’s Maulers, the 390th Bomb Group, Third Wing of the Eighth Air Force, stationed in East Anglia, England.
The frame also contains his “lucky bastard” award, certifying the completion of his tour of duty on Christmas Eve, 1944. After 35 missions as a co-pilot he was “now eligible to return to God’s country (the lucky bastard).”
Finley enlisted in June 1942, on the day he graduated from Washington High School in Milwaukee. He didn’t attend his graduation because his family had, as he says, “dragged me to Indiana” by then, but he drove back to Milwaukee to sign up to go to war.
For the book, he relied extensively on his memory — prodigious — but also did considerable research, much of it via Google and at least 10 books. He consulted only two people: retired Col. Edward West of the U.S. Corps of Engineers, for issues regarding West Point and for military rank questions, and Anita, who read the book in process, chapter by chapter.
Anita, he says, is “both a friendly critic and my greatest supporter. She doesn’t hesitate to say, ‘That makes no sense’ or ‘Where’d you get that?’ ”
And you can bet he has a story about that, too.
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