What is it about an engine roaring into life that makes grown men go weak at the knees? This is a book about machines and the men who love them. Some of these men are quite odd. Having always been a mechanaphobe himself, living in the slow lane, Dan Kieran is on a mission to discover the allure of machines and man's need for speed. Follow Dan as he climbs aboard a penny-farthing for a jaunt around west London, drives a steam train through the 'alps', joins the pit lane crew of Mitsubishi for the Britcar 24-hour race at Silverstone, discovers the link between Lawrence of Arabia and the 'wall of death', meets tank (yes, tank) collectors and the men behind 'digger ballet', learns to fly in the shadow of Douglas Bader and, along the way, wrestles with Aristotle, Jeremy Clarkson, Plato, Hunter S. Thompson and, mostly, himself. Join Dan as he makes a journey of discovery into another world, the happy and quirky world of the Great British potterer and machine enthusiast. Could he even be tempted to stay there?
- ISBN10 071952329X
- ISBN13 9780719523298
- Publish Date 27 May 2010 (first published 11 June 2009)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 8 October 2013
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher John Murray Press
- Imprint John Murray Publishers Ltd
- Format Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
- Pages 272
- Language English