ROCKIN' honoured as 'Book of the Month' in January '07 OCTANE Magazine (UK)

The prestigious OCTANE Magazine (published in the UK) honored (or, honoured) ROCKIN' by naming it "Book of the Month" in the January, 2007 issue (#43).

It's hard to put into words what this means to me. For a time (before I got on to Fast Freddie Lorenzen of mid-'60s NASCAR fame and the great A/Gas and C/Gas competition drag coupes of Stone/Woods/Cook and Big John Mazmanian) I was a UK buff, growing up first as a huge fan of Jim Clark, the great Formula One driver for the Lotus team. I read--avidly, cover to cover--all the sports car magazines I could find in Englewood, NJ, rooted for the Ford GT's to beat the Ferraris at Le Mans, and if you asked me in high school what car I most wanted to drive, it probably would have been the Austin Healey 3000.

So to see my book reviewed alongside columns by Jay Leno and Nick Mason (of Pink Floyd), and interspersed with features on . . .

. . . Richard Petty; the Lotus Cortina; the long-lost "Serenissima" Ferrari-like street racer; and the cover story on all the aircooled Porsche 911's . . .

plus

. . . a huge and authoritative review of cars in films and a nostalgic look at Wellington boots . . .

plus

. . . reviews of books from all over the world ("The Incredible Blitzen Benz;" "The Jaguar XK120;" "British Mini Racing") and all those incredibly mouthwatering British ads . . .

well, gosh.

ROCKIN's editor, Dennis Pernu, also pointed out that the reviewer not only completely 'got it,' he saw the book as "a John Peel radio show on paper." Now that is a special comment indeed, because Peel was England's greatest DJ, a man of the most electic and informed tastes. By the time the review got to saying, "loud, thrilling, and utterly engrossing," well, it had me at John Peel.

I hope you can find OCTANE at your local bookstore's magazine rack. You'll see exactly why I'm so proud as hell of ROCKIN' and the friends it's made . . . and now, being seen, in such a nice light, across the pond.