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Jim Clonts graduated from
the University of Missouri with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and received his commission in the U.S. Air Force in 1988.
As a B-52G Stratofortress navigator-bombardier, he flew ten combat missions in Operation DESERT STORM. During his nearly ten
years of active duty service he amassed over 2,500 flying hours in the B-52G and H bombers, including 130 combat hours, and
was awarded the Air Medal, the Air Force Commendation Medal, the Air Force Achievement Medal, Southwest Asia Service Medal,
Kuwait and Kuwaiti Liberation Medals, Outstanding Unit Award with Valor, and the National Defense Service Medal. Jim Clonts
left the service in 1998 and is currently working in the field of engineering. He is a Civil Air Patrol pilot and enjoys building
experimental aircraft when he is not writing. Jim Clonts is the author of Virulent Winds
and When Penguins Flew and Water Burned. According to the book description of Virulent Winds, “The Middle
East unites under Islamic Jihad and former enemies, Sandor and Kumar, wage a war of terrorism against America. Russia secretly
offers to sell a dozen advanced MiG-41s to the United States along with a plan that is both daring and dangerous, but could
forever alter the balance of power in the Middle East. Hoping to destroy the unity between Kumar and Sandor, Russian Security
Advisor Victor Komiskov and his American counterpart, NSA Director Charles Michaels, assemble a covert strike team of hotshot
US and Russian pilots under the command of renegade General George “Maddog” Tanner. Flying the advanced jets from
a forgotten airfield, they wreak havoc across the Middle East. With the region on the brink of war, a lone US intelligence
officer discovers a terrifying Russian secret, and Captain David Olmstead, five minutes from weapons release, must make the
most important decision of his life.”
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According to the book description of
When Penguins Flew and Water Burned, “This is the story of a US Air Force navigator’s
journey from the schoolhouses of Air Training Command, to the nuclear alerts of the Cold War, to combat in a 35-year-old anachronism
called the B-52. From peacetime training missions to Desert Storm to the turmoil of the military drawdown that followed, the
author takes you inside the high-pressure world of military aviation where life and death are seconds apart and one mistake
might be all you get.”
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