It’s the most chilling era of the Cold War. Lieutenant Jon Hunt flies helicopters for the British Royal Navy, but when missions demand someone who has an extra helping of the right stuff, his name’s at the top of the Ministry of Defence’s list. That’s how we end up with these thrilling accounts of Hunt’s action-packed missions: infiltrating enemy bases, investigating new superweapons, tackling drug syndicates and extricating his men from hostage situations.
The Jon Hunt stories may be set in the Cold War, but the Soviet Union isn’t always the main adversary. The stories encompass the Falklands, the Middle East and the Caribbean, and while the backstory of superpower brinkmanship is always lurking just below the surface, writer Larry Jeram-Croft skilfully keeps everything in context in his perfectly balanced stories.
Listeners quickly latch on to the authentic tones of both the stories and the way they’re told and there are two reasons for that. First, Jeram-Croft spent 30 years in the Royal Navy, including time serving as a Lynx pilot, when he saw plenty of front-line action. The tales themselves might be technically fictional, but they always have one foot firmly in the real life of the Navy, its personnel and the powers that be.
The second source of authenticity is that it’s the writer himself who narrates his stories in these extraordinary adventure tales. He might not have the tricks of the trade that professional voice actors bring, but in their place are honesty and credibility that can’t easily be mimicked. It’s like being told tales of derring-do by a beloved uncle – you listen, you learn, you believe.
