On the Road Again
Up into the skies with a new airline, plus! New reviews and an Amazon tagline: "Customers find the book amazing and one of the best debut novels they've read in a long time."
Back to the real world of airline flying.
My time at Sunwing was something special—truly a fantastic place to work. Now, as I settle into life with Team Teal, I’ve started to hear and feel the welcomes from my new crew. And let me tell you, they mean more than you might think. Keep them coming.
There are few things more emotionally challenging than feeling alone in a massive organization. For a while, I did. It’s easy to feel like just another name on a schedule. But those greetings, that sense of camaraderie—it's starting to break through. I’m beginning to feel like I belong again. Part of the team. And that matters more than any amount of corporate bling.
But it’s always nice to see ex-Sunwing crew, like these two beauties on the bottom right.
The Handshake (Not the milkshake from In&Out Burger in LA)
There’s a lot wrapped up in that line-check-passed handshake. It marks the culmination of training, assessment, and trust—but one sentiment rises above the rest. When he extended his hand and said, “I’d put my family on your plane,” it wasn’t just a compliment. It was the highest form of endorsement a fellow pilot can offer. At its core, it meant this: he trusted me not just with an aircraft, but with the lives of the people he holds most dear.
Start Writing
Oh right, that old bean. “Start writing…”
For those that don’t know, each Substack post begins with a ghost text stating “start writing.”
I’m sitting at my desk watching the sun set on a mountain peak named Sky Pilot. Fitting. Eleven is the number of years remaining in my career. I’m haunted by the Tool song “Jimmy” playing in my headphones where Maynard makes multiple references to being eleven years old when his mother died. Not that I’m forecasting anything that tragic but it will be the year that I’m forced to retire. They say there are two kinds of final landings for pilot. The one he knows is coming, and the one he doesn’t.
Eleven to go. It seems my entire career has passed with the flick of fingers. I was the youngest of the pilots on the fight deck for what seemed endless years. And now I’ve been flying Boeings for 25 years, not to mention the ten years of flying small aircraft before that.
It’s odd to feel old. To be fifty-three. To struggle to replace old knowledge with new. Teaching an old dog old tricks on the same airplane has proven a great challenge. But it’s coming along and the procedures have become what they should be, normal.
As it turns out, this moment feels a lot like the rest—another stretch of controlled chaos nudging me forward through time. The sun rises, the planet spins, and life continues in its relentless rhythm. There's something comforting about the Earth’s rotation—so precise we can measure it to the second—yet my days rarely feel predictable. New challenges greet me daily. I’m not out there chasing them, but somehow, they keep finding me.
Eleven spins. A short time to remain in-industry, and yet when I think of my son (sons) at eleven years old, the age seems youthful, immature, not old in fact but eleven years young.
And that is how old Declan’s brother will be when I retire. Eleven. We are discussing names, a little more orderly than last time. Scandinavian is the theme. Your guesses are welcome in the comments section. Go on have a guess. I’ll mail a signed copy of not only The Sequence but False Ignition when it’s released to the winner. And to get things rolling, I’ll hand out 3 months of paid access to my Substack for free for anyone that posts a guess.
What I’m Reading
God Emperor of Dune [4] (Finished!), Airplane manuals FOM and COM, QRH, Checklists. I need a break from Herbert’s door stoppers so I tucked into some Canadian Literature, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz by Mordecai Richler. Much lighter reading and a large step in the opposite direction in time.
What I’m watching: Sports, F1 and the NHL playoffs. But they all took a back seat to Star Wars: Andor. What a perfect series. Maybe the top 3 Star Wars things ever. So well done, can’t wait to re-watch it.
A quick reprieve:
Ski day on my birthday back in February with Eric Martin and the one and only Kevin Shiu.
What I’m up to:
A renewed interest in The Sequence and where I have taken its sequel, False Ignition. Some new praise I received from a couple of recent reviews has reignited the spark (see what I did there…) to get it done before the baby arrives.
“The Sequence is a masterclass in immersive sci-fi storytelling.” – Aidan Kearns
“Up there with Three Body Problem, Altered Carbon. I hope Mr Telford is working on another one. I would definitely recommend.” – Sonya Thompson.
Amazon has this to say:
“Customers find the book amazing and one of the best debut novels they've read in a long time. They describe the world as fantastically interesting, with exciting science-fiction concepts rooted in emerging technology. Readers also describe the book as fast-paced and brilliant.”
Here’s the link, I’m not making this up! The Sequence You do need to scroll down a page to find the “Customers say” section.
All for now.
Remain calm.
Res ipsa loquitur.
Let the good times roll.
And for the paid subscribers (THANK YOU!) a look at the prologue for False Ignition.
PROLOGUE
Apophis I
The People’s Republic of China, Hong Kong, Central District
HK Police Department. Special Crimes Division
Johnny Woo
“What do you mean, we’re letting him go? He’s got no legs, he’s not going anywhere.”
“What the boss wants, Woo. My hands are tied.”
Was bullshit was what it was. Woo paced. “I spent weeks on this case, and specifically did what you requested, brought in Chen Rong to remove the head from the snake.”
Behind the superintendent, pixels woven inside glass darkened their tint in a silent horizontal cascade, fighting to dim incoming beams of late afternoon sun. He imagined the super’s boss, recording their conversation via some undisclosed lens buried in the window’s framework, waiting for him to snap, documenting his behaviour for a future discipline that for now remained a Woo-Created-Fiction.
The super reclined. Thick, ropey fingers interlacing behind his freshly razored head. With visible effort, he lifted his legs atop the empty, polished-aluminum desk, sighing as he crossed them.
“This goes way above you and me, Woo. Let it go. This is no snake. This is the head of the Dragon we’re talking about here.” Superintendent Lee’s eyes surveyed his office, a complete sweep, though his head remained perfectly still. A non-verbal message that there was active surveillance operating in the room.
“Heard that before.”
Woo never figured the super for a cop on the take. Meant Woo needed to be careful. Investigating the Wo Shing Wo was ill advised and rarely spoken of. Triad lenses drifted on the wind, catching whiffs of gossip, whispers of data, recording conversations just like this one with synthetic ears far too small for any human senses to trace.
Behind the Super, through the darkening tinted pixels of his office window, a flash high in the sky, brighter than daylight, the glass immediately blackened by the tiny light sensitive pixels embedded in the window. Woo ducked, concerned there may have been a bomb blast outside the precinct. Later, learning that a large asteroid named Apophis had, as had been widely predicted though not generally believed, slammed into the moon.
Woo considered the super’s warning, the flash outside. Dragons breathed fire, and while he was no believer in superstition, he took heed of the warning, let the conservation die, and closed the superintendent’s office door behind him. As he’d been told once by a member of the Order of Nine themselves, they knew him now. And to be known by dragons was a dangerous thing indeed.