They say if you can remember the Sixties you could not have been there. Well post war baby boomer Trevor Cherrett was there and he can remember them. But his memories are more about what it was really like to grow up in one of the most rapidly changing periods in Britain`s history, as the country emerged from the destruction of the Second World War to a new world of peace, prosperity and the Welfare State. Born almost in sight of the red funnelled Cunarders in the port of Southampton – and on the edge of the Luftwaffe`s bombing run just a few years before – the author evokes his early years of national health orange juice, cod-liver oil, and school milk; discovering the joys of exploring the (then) sleepy country town of Ringwood where you could get away with tri-cycling halfway to Bournemouth; and growing up by the harbours and beaches of Mudeford and the South Coast . In frank detail he explores how he experienced the trials and tribulations of family life and girlfriends in a period which invented `the teenager` and witnessed the passing of much of the `old order`; how school shaped his life in the days of the 11 Plus and the great divide between Grammar schools and Secondary Moderns, and the new opportunities to go to University; and how growing up on the South Coast and the New Forest opened the door to his passions for fishing, boating and football. Like many baby boomers, Trevor acknowledges that they were, and are, a fortunate generation. But, he argues, it wasn`t just good luck or - worse – some kind of inter- generational conspiracy. Much of their good fortune was the result of far-sighted post-war policies aimed at creating a fairer as well as a more prosperous society. And he believes those policies have lessons for us today. This is not the autobiography of a Celebrity. Rather it is the story of an Everyman living through an extraordinary period of history, and making the links between his personal endeavours and the social, economic and cultural changes that affected his life, and the different places in which they were played out.

We think of baby boomers as the generation born after WWII, but most wars lead to a crop of baby boomers. Author Trapp suggests that, for those born after WWI, the world has been a remarkable evolving panorama of change, more extensive than that experienced by any other generation alive today. Unfortunately, there are few World War I Baby Boomers left, particularly those with WWII military service. Fortunately, one of those is Phil Trapp. Even more fortunately for the reader, he is a gifted story teller. "Memoirs of a World War I Baby Boomer" is an engaging collection of life stories and reflections that chronicle one man's unique journey through the 20th century into the 21st. The stories alone would be reason enough to read these memoirs. Some stories tell of seemingly mundane everyday experiences that turn out to be rich in life lessons and insights. Other stories are dramatic and moving, particularly incidents from his military service at Iwo Jima and Okinawa during WWII. While the chapters follow the chronology of his life, Trapp uses thoughtfully selected vignettes to shed light on the unique forces and context that shaped the WWI baby boomers and to personalize their impact. There is something for everyone in "Memoirs of a World War I Baby Boomer." It is rich in historical and human detail and humor. Trapp's anecdotes about his family's history remind us of how few steps separate us from the early leaders of our country. For example, Phil's ancestor knew such remarkable historical figures as Washington and Jefferson. And Phil's grandfather was alive in the days of the Civil War. As Trapp's life is explored in subsequent chapters synchronized with major world changes and life stages, the Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression come to light in new personalized ways. We learn how both family and events shaped his thinking, and we come to treasure such unique characters as his mother and grandfather for their very specific views of how one is to live one's life and see the world. Admittedly, the World War II chapter is particularly powerful and poignant. His earlier novel "The Red-Ribboned Letters" captured elements of that experience. Larger issues of war and humanity are conveyed with honestly and pain here in the memoirs. The remaining chapters guide us through Phil's return from WWII to a world filled with educational opportunities and hope. Not surprisingly, he chose the route of clinical psychology. There are intriguing vignettes of the early stages of the psychology profession and graduate education in this field. Trapp explores his time at the University of Arkansas, painting a picture of how different the university world was in decades past. He also provides snapshots of his engagement in other events of state and national importance, reminding us how one individual can make a difference. The retirement years are presented in the context of how they have been informed by this remarkable life trajectory. The final chapter is direct and without apology in its offer of guidance and its predictions about the future. As a whole, the "Memoirs of a World War I Baby Boomer" is a delightful and thought-provoking account of one person's perspective on a life story that began with birth in the aftermath of WWI. Phil has no trouble sharing this story honestly and humorously. Ultimately, he has a message for us all--about the impact of history upon one's life and the lessons that can be learned after 95 years on this planet.

This is a story of the Seventies by one baby boomer, viewed through his particular life of travel, work, romance and recreation. Starting Out is not the sensational story of a celebrity, but rather a unique perspective by one witness of a decade that began the hope of flower power and love and ended in the winter of discontent and the advent of Thatcherism. It forms Volume Two of Trevor Cherrett's autobiography Post War Boy and traces his emigration to the 'cod and fog' of Newfoundland for his first job, travels to Mexico with his girlfriend from university to watch the 1970 World Cup, and their return to London after some fraught and accident-prone travels. It is a story of time, place, and politics, viewed through working in London, the new city of Milton Keynes and later the county of Derbyshire. It is also the story of an exploration of the waterways of England in 20ft wooden clinker boat named Morgan, "a suitable case for treatment" as sub-titled in the film of the era, starring Vanessa Redgrave and David Warner. Besides these adventures Starting Out is also about personal feelings and relationships, candidly explored in a decade that saw the end of many dreams of radical change or revolution, but which also experienced the birth and growth of women's liberation and feminism. The author traces the impacts that these movements had on his life and loves, and reflects on the joys and tragedies of the decade for himself and the wider world.

My book is my biography as a typical baby boomer born after the Second World War, growing up in the '50s and early '60s, which were my happy times, which would end with my enlistment in the marines! My book ends with the political fallout from that war.

Soviet Baby Boomers traces the collapse of the Soviet Union and the transformation of Russia into a modern, highly literate, urban society through the life stories of the country's first post-World War II, Cold War generation.

A Berkshire Boyhood: Neither celebrity-gawk, "misery memoir," nor confessional melodrama, A Berkshire Boyhood is more reminiscent of such memoirs as Tobias Wolff's This Boy's Life and Emily Fox Gordon's Are You Happy? In fact, A Berkshire Boyhood will strike readers as a parallel universe to Gordon's book, her own story of growing up in Williamstown, Massachusetts, as a privileged faculty brat and young girl in the 1950s. Berkshire Boyhood is a boy's story of growing up from working class roots in that same place and time. Although A Berkshire Boyhood explores family troubles arising out of the wounds and separations of World War II, ethnic religiosity, and adolescent sexuality (1950s variety), its deeper appeal comes from our curiosity about the 1950s and the Boomer generation, from the fraught relations between that generation and their parents who fought World War II, from our renewed interest in the influence of landscape on human development, and from a vision of the early post-war years as a decade seething with the anger and dissent of an incipient counterculture that would explode the sixties.

A Berkshire Boyhood: Neither celebrity-gawk, "misery memoir," nor confessional melodrama, A Berkshire Boyhood is more reminiscent of such memoirs as Tobias Wolff's This Boy's Life and Emily Fox Gordon's Are You Happy? In fact, A Berkshire Boyhood will strike readers as a parallel universe to Gordon's book, her own story of growing up in Williamstown, Massachusetts, as a privileged faculty brat and young girl in the 1950s. Berkshire Boyhood is a boy's story of growing up from working class roots in that same place and time. Although A Berkshire Boyhood explores family troubles arising out of the wounds and separations of World War II, ethnic religiosity, and adolescent sexuality (1950s variety), its deeper appeal comes from our curiosity about the 1950s and the Boomer generation, from the fraught relations between that generation and their parents who fought World War II, from our renewed interest in the influence of landscape on human development, and from a vision of the early post-war years as a decade seething with the anger and dissent of an incipient counterculture that would explode the sixties.